Attack on Aincrad
by Spartaku
Summary: The 57th Expedition beyond the walls has begun, but while cut off from the main formation Armin's squad encounters something strange. Meanwhile, the Cardinal System that manages the world of Sword Art Online makes an unusual connection. When worlds collide, what will be left of the walls of humanity, or the floating castle Aincrad?
1. The Expedition

Author's notes: As it is probably obvious seeing as I am neither Reki Kawahara or Hajime Isayama, I do not own Sword Art Online or Attack on Titan. Just wanted to get that out there. As for spoiler warnings, the plot diverges from the canon events place halfway between the events of episodes 10 and 11 of the SAO anime and the beginning of episode 17 of the AoT anime (both from the first seasons, as they both only have one at the time of writing.), though both seasons should be finished for optimal spoiler avoidance. Though I will be taking some things from the SAO universe that will not appear in anime form unless the show manages to make it to four seasons at their current rate, I will try my best to steer clear of any spoilers those involve. Anyway, please enjoy the story and reviews are much appreciated! I so far only have this first chapter down, please let me know if you think it's worth continuing!

Year: 850 KS (Kyojin Sekai)

_This was it,_ thought Armin. They were really in the land of the titans now. He urged his horse on, keeping in formation with the rest of his squad. Despite his grim resolution to join the Scouting Regiment after the Battle of Trost with full firsthand experience of the consequences, Armin still felt a tingle of fear up his spine as he heard the ominous boom of the Kanesh District gate closing behind him. They were now separated from the farthest human-controlled wall and the thousands of people that counted on the scouts to bring the dawn of a day where none had to live in fear of being devoured. After one last, wistful gaze at the walls of the district and Wall Rose behind it, Armin turned back ahead, and lightly tugged at the reins so as to fall in line with the rest of the soldiers. The 57th Scouting Expedition beyond the walls had begun!

The dirt from the road spewed in his face as Armin wheeled his horse around. The animal obeyed his frantic will, galloping in the opposite direction to where they had been going. The sound of the earth shaking told Armin all he needed to know about what was behind him. Gritting his teeth, he steered the horse with his left hand and fumbled with his flare gun in his right. Though the devices, used to mark Titans, safe areas, and variants in the formation strategy employed by the scouts to navigate enemy territory with as few casualties as possible, had been taught in training, he had never had to actually fire one while mounted. _C'mon,_ thought Armin, _not ANOTHER piece of faulty equipment?_ From the sound of the giant footfalls, his pursuer was getting closer. Finally, the corresponding shell for a Titan sighting entered the chamber with a satisfying click, and the boy fired into the air. As the red plume ascended into the clear sky, Armin turned around for a brief moment, and stared into the face of hell.

The Titan was not the biggest he'd seen, only an 8-meter, but the fat creature was still unnaturally fast, and seemed to have only one thing on it's tiny mind: Armin Arlert soufflé. It was a dark blonde, much darker than Armin's own hair color, and like all Titans it's face looked as it it were in a perpetual state of being either too stretched or too scrunched. Armin hated them, hated them for denying humanity the world, hated them for eating his grandfather, hated them for eating his friends, and hated them for likely eating his parents. Hated them, and yet he was powerless to avenge them with his own hands. Though many a Titan had fallen because of his plan to retake Trost, when facing the creatures himself with blade in hand Armin could do nothing. This paralysis would have killed him if not for his best friend, Eren Jaeger, who had almost died himself because of it. Armin could never fully forgive himself for that. Even now, in whilst still in an abandoned city where the maneuvering gear could be used effectively, he could do nothing but run from his pursuer.

Even running seemed like not an option right now. The Titan raised its hand, and brought it down as if to pluck Armin right off his horse. The boy's eyes widened, and he pulled at the reins for the horse to swerve into another street. Armin had lost sight of the formation by now, but he could hear the clopping of the footfalls of hundreds of horses if only his heart stopped trying to burst from his chest out of terror. The Titan pulled onto the street right after him, pulling it's hand through the air as if homing in on the comparatively tiny form of the boy on the horse. The Titan's hand slowly descended upon him. _No_, thought Armin, _not again. I will not freeze up like a good little snack anymore, you demon!_ He pulled his blades out of their sheathes, guiding the horse now with only his legs. But as the fingers of the Titan started to surround him, the panic flowed back in like a faucet. The creature grabbed him by his Scout cloak, and despite squirming mightily Armin could not shake free. As he swung his blades futilely in desperation, the Titan seemed to smile, lifting the dangling boy toward it's maw. Armin shut his eyes. He was finished. However, suddenly he heard a noise that gave him enough energy to yell: the high-pitched zip of a 3D maneuvering gear in use.

A quick sound of flesh being sliced right through by metal, and the Titan and it's hand parted ways. Armin realized he was still falling toward the monster's mouth, and fired his cables and gas, jetting away from the creature. The Titan closed it's jaws around where he had been a second ago, Armin noticed from his new perch on an abandoned store. Armin was one of the few humans who had been in a Titan's mouth before and lived to tell the tale. It was a horrifying experience, the feeling that out of all the ways to die you were going to be eaten alive. Something Armin never wanted to experience EVER again. A green-clad figure zipped through the street behind the Titan, blades out. Armin couldn't tell who his savior was, they were flying through the city so fast. They shot a cable to either side of the street to slow themselves as they reached their quarry, and with a x-shaped swipe of their blades cut deep into the back of the Titan's neck, their one and only weak point. The creature collapsed to the ground, it's slayer coming to a stop right in front of it.

Armin jetted himself down to the street. The other scout was cleaning his blades. Armin ran up to his savior, but he didn't have words for what had happened. Despite all he had been through, Armin had froze up. Again. He couldn't bear it to have one of the senior scouts see him paralyzed like that. The other scout lifted his hood to reveal..."Reiner!?" Armin exclaimed.

"You didn't expect it to be another member of the 104th out of the entire Expedition, did you Armin?" Reiner said, laughing. It was a good laugh, deep and true.

"N-no," Armin said, "Isn't your squad supposed to be far ahead of mine?"

"It was, but Jean misread one of the flares and we fell behind a bit earlier."

"That's good for me, I guess..." Armin chuckled nervously.

"Don't worry Armin, your secret 's safe with me." Reiner said knowingly. Of course he knew, thought Armin, he was there at Trost. That hell where Armin had watched his entire squad die...

Reiner spoke. "Still, we better find your horse before the formation leaves us. If we left you behind here, Eren would never let me here the end of it."

"Yeah, you're right." Armin whistled, and pretty soon his mount galloped back into view unharmed. Titans only deliberately targeted humans, after all. Reiner did the same, and together they rode back towards the formation.

After about 45 minutes, the Scouting Regiment had cleared the old city. The wilderness surrounding the Cadet Training Grounds had been Armin's only real encounter with a non-urban region in years, and the vast emptiness that greeted the made his eyes widen. Sure, they had come here 5 years earlier, fleeing the swarm of Titans that had poured through the breach in Wall Maria, but Armin had been far too terrified to do any sightseeing. "It's a shame" Jean "If it weren't for that damn Armored Titan, this place would probably have been used to help fix that food shortage a couple years ago. We wouldn't have had to launch that suicidal mass expedition to try and retake this." Reiner simply concentrated on steering his horse, looking grimly ahead. Too late, Jean realized his mistake. He took a little longer, and then finally said, "Sorry guys, I forgot-"

"That both Armin and I lost our homes in that? Yeah." Reiner finally said.

"H-hey, better that Jean's not with us in that, eh Reiner?" Armin said, trying to defuse the sudden tension between the two.

"Yeah." Reiner said, clearly indicating that this particular topic of discussion was closed as far as he was concerned. Armin nodded in agreement to the end of it, and out of the corner of his eye he saw Jean do so as well.

"There's another green flare." Jean said fifteen minutes later. Despite being close enough to the rest of the expedition to see their flares and avoid the marked Titans, Armin, Reiner, and Jean had yet to catch up with it. They turned their horses to the direction of the commander's new flare, still galloping through the abandoned countryside. There were fewer buildings here, Armin noticed just the occasional farmer's cottage. Most seemed decayed merely by the normal toll of unchecked nature. However, a few bore the grisly signs, such as a smashed-in roof or collapsed side, that it's inhabitants had not thought to leave until a Titan was already upon them. "I wonder why we're turning west so much. Isn't our destination pretty far to the east?" Jean asked.

"Look at all the open countryside." Armin said,"Do you see any way the maneuvering gear could be used at all here?"

"No, you're right, there's practically nothing large to grab onto. And without the use of the maneuvering gear.."

"..humans simply can't fight something as huge and resistant as a Titan." Reiner finished.

Armin nodded. "And the region we seem to be headed for is heavily forested, and runs down much of the way south to Shiganshina. So much of the trip will be in an area where we will be able to fight, because of the trees. It's a lot safer, and there will probably be less Titans along that route as well."

"Since when did you get all this, Armin?" Jean teased.

"Just read the maps they showed us back at headquarters, it was obvious which way someone like Commander Erwin would go."Armin shook his head. Jean had the roots of a good leader, but strategic thinking secured victory just as much as knowing how to rally the men.

"You're probably right. He doesn't want to risk the few troops the Scout Regiment gets on a experimental push like this. Hey, there's the formation!" Jean exclaimed with relief. Armin gazed and head and sure enough, the supply wagons of the Scouting Regiment Expedition came into view, the green cloaks of their guards fluttering in the wind. The group adjusted course to arrive with them. All of a sudden, multiple red flares shot out only 100 meters in front of them. The formation veered sharply to the opposite side of the route Armin had deduced earlier to avoid an apparent group of Titans.

They soon passed where the red flares had originated from earlier, a small forest too tightly packed for even half the formation and thus not a suitable traversal spot. Armin saw a few Titans, what looked to be an 8-meter and a 15-meter, through the trees. They didn't seem to have noticed the soldiers; Erwin's strategy was working. _Even so,_ thought Armin, _no plan works perfectly against such foes. How many of our comrades have no doubt been already devoured?_ As if confirming his worst fears, a gut-wrenching scream suddenly was heard from within the forest. _But why, _thought Armin._ We had marked the area and the formation had avoided it. Why would someone go in there? Could they not have seen the flares_? Armin suddenly became aware that his was the only horse still moving; he stopped and turned around. Jean was staring angrily at the forest, his blades out. Reiner had stopped behind him, watching Jean with concern. "Damn them. Why couldn't they just follow the flares!" Jean cried, reaching for his controls.

"Jean, no!" Armin cried, but the other soldier leapt off his horse and fired his cables into the first trees of the forest.

"Damn him and his notion of a leader's responsibilities." Reiner grumbled, and followed Jean. Fear beginning to well up inside of him again, Armin shot after them with his maneuvering gear.

Weaving through the trees this close in was dangerous, with the tall trunks missing them by inches as the trio headed toward the scream. Still, it was far better than trying to fight the Titans out in the open, on the ground. _Why haven't they sent up any flares,_ Armin thought worriedly. _If we hadn't heard that scream we wouldn't even have known someone was still in here. Could they all be dead already, that scream we heard earlier nothing but their final dying cry before they became a monster's meal?_ A tree passed within inches of him as he maneuvered through the forest, and Armin felt his respect for Jean grow, as the other skillfully manuvered through the forest at extreme speed, though no one in the 104th was as fast as Mikasa. Reiner was right there with him. Jean seemed to stop on a high branch, which Armin slung himself up to with a shot of the maneuvering gear and a gentle deceleration via the gas. "Why did we st-" Armin began to ask, but then he looked down. In front of their tree was a clearing and a horrifying scene.

In the clearing, there were two Titans, a 15-meter and an 8-meter, like Armin had seen before. But their quarry was what puzzled and horrified Armin. 5 men, not much older than Jean or Armin, were standing in the clearing in a semicircle, facing the Titans. Armin could tell that they were by no means part of the Scouting Regiment. What they were wearing didn't conform to ANY of the military branches, at least none that Armin knew of. They had no maneuvering gear, so they couldn't be in the military. They didn't wear light brown shirts of the military, or any kind of clothes Armin was used to seeing. Instead, they seemed to wear black robes under some sort of scaly plating. All of the men's plating was colored red, though one seemed to have his colored that way because of bloodstains instead of paint._ Is that...armor?_ Armin wondered He had only seen humans wearing armor in his grandfather's book about the outside world. Apparently, when human militaries used to fight each other before the Titans came, some soldiers would wear it, as it protected against things like swords. And instead of the Titan-slaying pairing swords that Armin, Jean, and Reiner wielded, the 5 guys in armor seemed to wield an assortment of ancient weapons, from long straight swords, to what looked like pole weapons Armin remembered were called spears. In the center of the group, a man in his early twenties with dark red hair and a bright red headband stood, holding an elegant, wickedly-sharp looking curved sword. From the way he held himself, and watched the others, it was obvious he was their leader.

Another one of the armored fighters yelled, "K-k-Klein!" The leader turned in the speaker's direction. So your name is Klein, thought Armin. "W-what are we going to do?! Nothing works!" The original speaker yelled.

"They don't know about the weak spot?!" Reiner said in shock.

"Quiet!" Armin whispered, "The Titans haven't noticed us yet. If they hear you, we lose the element of surprise."

"But..."

"He's right." Jean said, though the look on his face told Armin he hated it as well. "Our best chance for helping these guys is if the Titans don't see us coming."

Meanwhile, the leader, Klein, responded to the other of his men. "I messaged Kirito and the others for backup, but I don't know how we're supposed to kill one of these things. They just...regenerate." He was trembling with fear. "And when they killed Dale..."

"There was blood...everywhere. He was screaming in agony, man! What the hell is going on!?" Shouted one.

"We aren't supposed to die like this!" Another said, his spear wobbling in his hands, "Damn you Kayaba, we aren't supposed to die like this!"

"Issin, Kunimittz, calm down!" Klein yelled. "If we don't pull it together we're all dead! Now get in a melee boss defensive formation, so we can slash it's hand if one of those damn things tries to grab us again!" Three of Klein's men nodded and seemed to be getting into some sort of hedgehog formation, but the last did not. T_his one's armor,_ thought Armin, _it's natural color isn't red. He's drenched in blood_. The Titans began striding towards the group, as the blood-soaked one broke formation. _Please,_ Armin thought, _just stay in the group. The Titans are nearly vulnerable to us._ Indeed, the monsters had almost completely turned their backs on where Jean, Reiner, and Armin were hiding, exposing their weak spot. Armin's plan, which he had discussed with the others while Klein was talking to his men, was nearly in place. These 5 mysterious men, who had obviously never seen a Titan before, would be safe. Then the blood-soaked one spoke. "Calm down? CALM DOWN!? That big one just ate Dale! I'm going to kill it!" He raised his sword and shield and charged the 15-meter Titan.

"Harry, no!" Klein yelled. Despite his best efforts, the one called Harry was soon grabbed by the 15-meter, terror and anger escaping incoherently from his lips. "Damnit, you're going to get us ALL killed!" He gripped his sword firmly, and charged the Titan. The behemoth made swipes at Klein with it's free hand, but he skillfully dodged all of them. Meanwhile, the rest of his men joined in. Klein leapt up, sword raised above his head, and Armin's eyes widened. The sword...was glowing. With one stroke, he severed the hand of the Titan holding Harry. "Did you see that..." Armin whispered. Everything about these guys was so strange, it had transfixed him.

"No time for that!" Jean yelled, "The Titans are distracted, we must strike now!" He and Reiner executed the plan, Reiner going for the 15-meter and Jean the 8-meter. "Armin, help those guys on the ground." His comrade's voice drew Armin out of his mind and back to the dangerous reality at hand. He shot his cables into the trees on the other side of the clearing, and maneuvered to the ground right behind Klein. "What...?" The red-haired man exclaimed as Armin landed. The 15-meter fell with a satisfying thud, and Reiner rolled onto the ground next to Armin. However, screaming turned Klein's attention along with that of the Scouts, to the 8-meter Titan. Jean had missed his first strike and was now jetting away from the angry creature. But what horrified Armin was what was in the Titan's mouth: Somehow, it had gotten one of the armored warriors half inside it's maw, his lower body hanging out of it. "No...Issin..." Klein said. He was paralyzed, shaken.

"God damn you! I won't let you eat him!" Jean roared, and leapt at the Titan's nape. His blades sunk into their target, taking the horrible giant's life...right as the Titan bit down on Issin's chest. There was massive spray of blood from both the creature's nape and mouth, as the now-lifeless legs of Issin fell to the ground. Klein dropped to his knees, leaning heavily on his curved sword, shaking at what had become of his comrade.

As they finally rested on the ground, the bodies of both the 8-meter Titan and Issin shattered. Where there had once been flesh was now a groups of floating blue crystals. "What...the hell..." Reiner said slowly.

Tears welling in his eyes, Klein dragged himself to his feet. "What do you mean, what the hell! That's the way you're supposed to die in SAO, painlessly shattering into a million polygons, not being bitten in half!"

"You're not soldiers, so you must be some kind of crazy civilians! You know you're not supposed to go beyond the walls, the Titans will eat you for sure like what just nearly happened to all of you!" Jean exclaimed, his voice rising.

"What walls? And Titans... That's what those damn THINGS are called, isn't it?! They aren't like any monster I've seen in SAO!"

_They have never heard of Titans..._ Armin thought, as a startling comrehension began to dawn. Slowly, he spoke: "What is this...SAO?" The surviving members of Klein's group's wide, terrified eyes got even wider. One of them, Harry, opened his mouth to speak, but the words were drowned out by a sudden shrill sound emanating from within a corner of the clearing. It was accompanied by a blindingly bright light. Armin shielded his eyes.

When it faded substantially, he uncovered his eyes. And gasped. It was as if the air around that clearing corner were made of water, and emerging from it were several figures. They charged through, weapons raised, only halting when they saw the destruction and blood that remained from the battle with the two Titans. The first appeared to be a middle-aged man with a grey ponytail, completely covered in red plate armor completely different from that of the men Armin, Jean and Reiner had saved. He was armed with a massive one-handed sword and a huge white shield adorned with a stylized red cross. Despite his age his face bespoke that he felt and fought like a much younger man. He was flanked by about 5 men who appeared to be in their twenties and one in his early thirties, all armed with either long swords and shields or massive, impressive-looking two-handed swords. They were armored similar to the first man, except for the fact that their armor's color scheme was a reversal of that of the first's shield.

Shortly after them came two others. One was a dark-haired boy, who looked to be the same age as the members of the 104th, who wore an elaborate dark coat with a shoulder strap running across the chest. He had two swords sheathed on his back, both elaborate blades, one black, one blue. When he saw the two pairing blades in Jean and Reiner's hands, his eyes widened, and he looked almost offended. Close behind him was a girl about the same age of stunning beauty, with long, rich brown hair and a tender face that made a part of Armin just want to melt into it despite never having met her before. She wore similar armor to the 5 men guarding the man in red, modified to fit her lithe form and keep her light on her feet. Her weapon, despite being like no sword Armin had ever seen in either life or book, looked like just the kind of single-sword weapon for such a nimble fighter: a long, razor-sharp blue needle with a magnificent circular hilt.

"What happened here, Klein?" The black-haired boy spoke.

Klein turned to face the newcomers, tears still in his eyes. "Kirito," He breathed, "they're dead."

"The non-present Fuurinkazan members...Dale and Issin?!" The black-haired boy looked shocked.

"Oh they're here, alright..." Klein said, doing a sad, little laugh of despair, indicating with his arms the blood that blanketed the forest floor.

"My God..." Said the girl. The black-haired boy moved to comfort her, whilst clenching his own hands into fists of silent rage.

"You!" Someone yelled behind him, and Armin turned to see that the grey-haired man in red had lowered his sword right at Jean's throat. A pair of the man's white-cloaked guards had their swords pointed at his own neck, and two more had done the same to Reiner. "You dare call ME a civilian?!"

"But what are you doing beyond Wall Rose like this? You're not part of the Scouting Regiment..."

"Jean, be quiet!" Armin yelled. "This is no time to be questioning the man holding you at swordpoint."

The grey-haired man seemed to smile at this, "Good, I knew at least one of you must be smart. Now, I have a few questions about what's going on here."

"While I would be happy to answer any questions from a fellow human," said Armin, "I must ask one of my own: who are you people?"

"I am Commander Heathcliff, leader of the Knights of the Blood Oath!" The grey-haired man replied. "These are my knights with me, some of whom are personal friends of Klein here. When Klein requested urgent aid, I decided to join them in trying to help him. I'm glad I did. Now," a subtle element of malice drifting into Heathcliff 's voice, "just who and what are YOU?"


	2. What Are You?

Author's Notes: As it is probably obvious seeing as I am neither Reki Kawahara or Hajime Isayama, I do not own Sword Art Online or Attack on Titan. I am glad people seemed to like my first chapter, and I am looking forward to continuing the series down my idea route now that I know it will actually be read :). I deeply appreciated all the reviews and feedback and other stuff you guys gave me from last chapter, please continue doing that! This chapter is a little different from the first one (how so will become obvious very soon), I hope you enjoy it!

Year: 2 SAOHI (Sodo Ato Onrain Hatsubai Irai)

What is this...SAO? The words kept ringing in Klein's mind. The short blond boy had asked them just before Kirito and the others showed up. No one had answered them, but still Klein couldn't understand why he would say something like that. Everyone had been summoned to Kayaba's sick little tutorial, hadn't they? _No,_ thought Klein, _it's more than that. Why the hell would you not know what game you were playing when you slotted the thing in and put the damn Nervegear rig on your head! But...they couldn't be NPCs, could they? No,_ he realized, _NPCs rarely fight monsters at all, and those three took down that god-awful field boss with almost no help from us. I never even saw the damn things' health bars. But still, how could a player not know what Sword Art Online was? _

Voices being raised behind Klein temporarily brought him out of his shocked stupor. Commander Heathcliff was pointing his weapon at one of the weird new guys, the one who killed the "smaller" monster. _The one who failed to save Issin...,_ thought Klein. _No, be thankful for them. At least all of Fuurinkazan wasn't wiped out, because of these strange guys. They risked their lives for someone they'd never met; I can appreciate that._ Klein walked slowly over to them, still not able to erase the pain from his face despite his best efforts to conceal it. The boy had obviously done something to offend the commander, which was not a wise decision. Heathcliff was man of many talents and titles, officially the leader of the Knights of the Blood Oath, the top clearing guild in SAO (much to the eternal ire of their rivals, the Divine Dragon Alliance) and unofficially the leader of the clearers as a whole and the strongest player in the game, having never been beaten or even have his health drop into the yellow zone.

The guy in the middle, who was the one Heathcliff was pointing his sword at, had short brown hair, and all three of the new guys wore a sort of green cloak over a light brown jacket and a white undershirt. The cloak had a weird wing motif on the back. Their guild sigil? The brown-haired guy seemed to have called Heathcliff a civilian or something. _Civilian, huh? Are these guys some sort of top-secret clearer party from the Army?_ Klein hoped not, he had witnessed the last Army attempt to curry favor with the clearers by sending a platoon of their men to try and take out a Floor Boss. It had ended in a massacre for the poor guys, all due to their incompetent commander Kobatz. While Heathcliff and the brown-haired guy bickered back and forth, Kirito came up to Klein, stopping him halfway to the others. "I'm too late again, aren't I?" Kirito said, looking grimly at the devastation. "It's just like that fight with the boss on the 74th floor. No, it's worse; I knew these guys." Before he had hooked up with Asuna, Kirito had sometimes hunted with Fuurinkazan on clearing missions before.

Klein smiled wistfully, it was all he could manage. "They were great guys. I wish that you could have known them better..."

"Klein, I'm sorry..."

"No, Kirito. Don't apologize to me. Not now." Klein said, laying a hand on the younger man's shoulder. Kirito never seemed to forgive himself for refusing to join Klein's guild at the start of this death game, but Klein would never let him apologize. It wasn't something you needed to apologize for, and it gave Kirito a slightly kinder disposition, among other things.

"So, how did they die? Did those guys kill them?" Kirito shot another disgusted look at the newcomers, Klein had noticed he had been occasionally doing that ever since he caught sight of them.

"What!? No, their cursors are still green, can't you see?" Klein said. Above each of the three hovered a green player crystal, which had they killed Dale and Issin would be orange instead.

"Then what happened?"

"We came through this thing that looked like a safe zone entrance; you must have noticed it when you came in. Instead, it dumped us in this place." Klein raised his arms to indicate the clearing.

"So this must be some kind of special field dungeon, huh?"

"Seems that way. But the minute we entered we somehow aggroed these two giant human-looking field bosses. They were huge, as tall as a large tree!"

"Two field bosses immediately out of the gate? What kind of dungeon is this?!"

"We tried to teleport out, but our crystals wouldn't work. When we tried to go back through the gate, it gave us an error message. That's when I messaged you and Asuna, to see if you could open the gate from your end."

Kirito nodded. "We had to wait a couple minutes once we found that gate, but all of a sudden it seemed to activate and we arrived here. So you threw all you had at the bosses? How could Dale and Issin die to something like a minor field boss, weren't they both level 93?"

"We threw all our skills at them, with all sorts of different weapons. But, Kirito...they regenerate. A sword skill chop to the hand will cut it off, but it'll just re-materialize a few seconds later. We couldn't kill them." Klein's face darkened.

"An...immortal boss?" Kirito's eyes widened. "But isn't that impossible due to game balance?"

"They can be killed apparently. We just weren't the one's who did it. That goes to those three guys over there, more specifically that brown-haired one the commander is talking to and that tall blond one at the end."

"Of course they did." Kirito said, his fists clenching again.

"What's bothering you so much about them, Kirito? You get pissed every time you look at them." Klein asked, concerned.

"Look at their weapons." Kirito said.

Klein looked carefully in the pair of blades in each of their hands. "I don't see what's...oh. It's the fact that they're dual-wielding, isn't it? I thought that was a unique skill?" Kirito's look of increasing anger on his face told Klein his answer.

"Those guys have a lot of questions to answer, and not just from the commander." Kirito nodded at Heathcliff, who now seemed to have switched his attention from the offensive brown-haired one to the short blond boy who had asked the question that was still rattling around in Klein's head. _I don't even know their names, _thought Klein. They were obviously skilled, having killed a boss that was absolutely tearing into a clearing guild like Klein's own Fuurinkazan, and were fighting on this unexplored section of the frontlines on Floor 75.

"Go easy on these guys Kirito, they did save my guild...what was left of it by the time they got here anyway." Klein's face darkened. He kept trying to suppress the. Thoughts that crept dangerously into his mind, memories and emotions that he didn't want to have have to deal with until the current crisis was dealt with. _I will grieve for you,_ thought Klein, _when I...muster the strength._

Despite what Klein had said to him, Kirito still didn't appear fully cooled off, and Klein noticed the boy's hand kept hovering near the hilt of his trusty Elucidator longsword as he walked toward Heathcliff and the others. Sighing, Klein followed him. The short blond one of the three strangers seemed to have finished asking something to the commander. Heathcliff nodded, and lowered his sword a little. "I am Commander Heathcliff, leader of the Knights of the Blood Oath!These are my knights with me, some of whom are personal friends of Klein here. When Klein requested urgent aid, I decided to join them in trying to help him. I'm glad I did." He let this sink in, but surprisingly being addressed by the leader of the top clearing guild garnered no real reaction among the three strangers, though the short blond one seemed to have an expression of mild curiosity and apprehension "Now, just who and what are YOU?" The commander seemed highly angry or concerned about something, that was for sure. Klein knew little of the man as a person, since the commander of the Knights of the Blood Oath seemed to rarely appeared in public other than major clearing missions such as Floor Boss fights and strategy meetings, but Asuna seemed to trust him well, and Kirito trusted Asuna implicitly. They were husband and wife, after all. Even the state of this being a virtual reality couldn't change all the implications of THAT. In any case, what Kirito said was legitimate enough for Klein. Now it remained for the strangers to respond.

The short one made his move. He sheathed his two swords in the two strange metal boxes the strangers seemed to have around their waists, which contained what looked like grappling hooks and gas canisters in addition to other identical blades. Klein had seen them in action earlier, when the three had seemed to fly through the air at breakneck speed in their assault on the bosses. _Now what the hell kind of item drop is that, I wonder?_ Thought Klein. Once his blades were away, the blond boy closed his hands into fists, and held them palm-down onto his torso. The right hand was over his heart, the left over the small of his back. The other two strangers followed suite. _What is that, some kind of salute?_ The boy spoke: "I am Armin Arlert, graduate of the 104th Training Corps, and Private in the Scout Regiment!" The other two boys followed suite, first the brown-haired boy: "Jean Kirstein, graduate of the 104th, Private in the Scout Regiment!", and then the tall blond one with a military-style cut: "Reiner Braun, graduate of the 104th, Private in the Scout Regiment!"

"What is the Scout Regiment? I've never heard of it before, and I usually keep myself appraised of all the guilds on the frontlines." Heathcliff asked, not putting his own sword away but signaling his guards with his hands to sheath their own weapons. _They have military ranks, _thought Klein. _And their guild is something called the Scouting Regiment. But there's no way these guys are associated with the Army, if they had some items like those devices these guys are carrying the news would be all over Aincrad by now! _

The jaws of the other two newcomers, Jean and Reiner it seemed their names were, simultaneously dropped. "What the hell do you mean, you've never even heard of the Scout Regiment!? And what in the name of God is a guild?!" They exclaimed.

"Guys," the short one, Armin, said quitely, "when I mentioned it to that guy with the red hair", Klein found himself being pointed at by Armin, "he said he had never heard of Titans."

Jean's hand flew to his mouth, and a deep intake of breath was heard. The other one, Reiner, murmured: "Never...heard...of Titans." He slumped to the ground, holding his head in his hands.

"What the hell is a Titan?" Kirito asked.

"That's what they called the two bosses earlier. Just before you came." Klein said. "The things that killed Dale and Issin."

Kirito visibly grew nervous, and looked around the forest worriedly. "And the way these guys are talking about these things, it also makes it seem..." He began.

"...that there are a lot more of those things out there. Yeah, I'd noticed that too. And that's not even the worst thing." Klein said. Kirito opened his mouth to ask what was, but Armin spoke again, this time to Heathcliff and them.

"Do you even know about the walls? Any of you?" He looked nervous, as if an almost incomprehensible idea was taking shape in his mind. What walls, thought Klein. He and the other two had kept mentioning something about walls...

As if taking the words right off his train of thought, someone spoke. This time, it was Kirito. "What kind of walls? Is there something about the walls on this dungeon we should be concerned about?"

"You don't even know about the walls...The names Sina, Rose, and Maria mean nothing to you?" Armin said, fear creeping into his voice. He took a step back from Kirito and the others, his nervousness visibly increasing.

"What are those, players?" I've never heard of them." Kirito, looking around to the other Knights, who all shook their heads. Kirito looked back at the three strangers again, and Klein saw his eye alight over their weird weapon sheaths. Their dual weapon sheaths, which was what Klein guessed was what was had once again gotten his attention. Kirito looked back up at their owners, who now all looked quite pale, and spoke: "And just how the HELL did you get the Dual-Wielding skill? It's supposed to be unique to me!"

Armin seemed shaken out of his worried stupor by the black-haired boy's tone. "Wh-what skill? What's that supposed to mean?"

"Kirito's right. The Dual-Wielding Sword Skill is supposed to be a unique skill, according to the system. Yet you're all carrying two swords." Heathcliff said, malice creeping back into his voice as he and Kirito stared questioningly at the three members of the Scout Regiment.

"Sword Skill...was that that glowing thing around Klein's blade earlier?" The one called Jean asked. They don't even know what a Sword Skill is? Just who the hell are these guys, and how have they survived this long? Then again, it didn't look like any sword skill when they killed those bosses...or should I call them Titans? Everything about these guys and what he had seen since entering this damn clearing had defied everything Klein knew about SAO, that was for sure.

"Do you not even know your Skills?" Kirito asked incredulously. Klein couldn't blame him. Looking puzzled, Jean shook his head and shrugged. "Alright, just open the menu and they should all be there under Skills." When blank, even more puzzled and nervous looks were returned to him, Kirito sighed, and held up his index and middle finger of his right hand, and indicated a downward swiping motion in front of his face. Armin and Jean mimicked him, and the familiar white menu interface of Sword Art Online appeared in front of them. _There,_ thought Klein. _They're not that strange after all._ Then the blond boy screamed.

It was so strange, so unexpected, it was almost comical. Armin was on his knees, his eyes as wide as dinner plates, hyperventilating like an out-of-shape runner after a marathon. The menu hovered in front of him. The boy blinked. It was still there. He rubbed his eyes. It was still there. _But..., _thought Klein, _it's physically impossible for an SAO player to never have seen the drop-down interface. There's just no way. Armin, however, looks like he's never seen anything like it. Could they really be NPCs?_ Klein didn't want to believe it, couldn't believe it. They were behaving exactly like a human would in this situation. _There's no way someone, not even Akihiko Kayaba, who could design a top-down AI as sophisticated as these guys. Is there?_ All around Klein, the others erupted into startled chatter.

"They've never seen the menu before..."

"That's impossible..."

"Could they be A.I.s? I've never heard of anything this advanced..."

"Don't even know what guild is..."

"Then what's that symbol on their cloaks? That Scout Regiment thing?"

"I've never heard of it..."

"Well obviously not since it's apparently not a guild..."

Only himself and the other Fuurinkazan members remained silent. _What is this...SAO? _Armin's unanswered question floated through the man's mind. He glanced over to the three strangers. Armin was still on the ground, shaking, his wide eyes fixated on the menu, his face still stuck in a silent cry of utter shock and fright. Reiner just kept on blinking, trying to process what he was seeing. Jean reached down to his short comrade, tapping Armin on the shoulder. The boy seemed to not respond. "Damn this," Jean swore, "he's gone catatonic again! You!" He pointed at Kirito, angrily. "Just what is that thing?!"

"It's the Sword Art Online menu, what do you think it is? I just..." Kirito looked astounded at the turn of events. Just what was going on here?

"Sword Art Online? S...A...O? Was that what you guys fighting the Titan meant? What does the word Online even mean?" There was a collective gasp. _They're not players_, thought Klein. _Damn what the U.I. and their behavior tells me, they are definitely not players. Just what the hell are they? _

Several of the SAO players opened their mouths to respond. Just then, a new voice joined the conversation: a melodic, feminine voice. "Cut these guys some slack before you traumatized them!" Asuna, who had been tending to the other Fuurinkazan members at the other side of the clearing, stepped in between the guys and the three Scouts. "Maybe they have amnesia or something?"

"Of this degree?" Heathcliff said doubtfully. "There's absolutely no way. Sword Art Online is supposed to provide mental support programs to prevent that kind of thing."

"Correct." Asuna said "But given the suicide rate since Kayaba sealed us in here, they don't seem to be working. Has anyone actually seen one since this all started?" Everyone shook their heads. "Now, let's try this a little...less...harshly." She turned to face Jean and the others. "What year is it?" She asked calmly. When Jean looked at who was speaking to him, his eyes widened, and he slowly spoke "850..."

Asuna grew concerned. She walked back to where the Knights, Klein and her husband were standing, "They don't even know they're in SAO anymore...We should take them back to the Town of Beginnings. That may jog their memories." Asuna said to Heathcliff.

The grey-haired commander nodded. "We'll need a place for them to stay before we take them there. The Army's doing several raid-style training maneuvers just outside the city, and I don't want our friends here being interrogated or searched. Those items..." He glanced at the strange rope-and-gas devices on the trio's backs. "We can't very well take them to Granzum; the Knight's headquarters is too conspicuous. How about the Fuurinkazan headquarters?" Heathcliff glanced at Klein.

Nervously, Klein thought of his answer. It was sad, but he felt there was no other way. He didn't even want to imagine what their guild home would be like, without Dale and Issin. _I'll never be able to go into their rooms, he thought, without seeing their faces, hearing the screams._ Unbidden, memories flowed into his mind. Past games, faces, the origins of Fuurinkazan. _No_, thought Klein, _not now!_ Either way, Armin, Jean, and Reiner would likely have to stay in the now-vacant rooms. The rooms of those they were too late to save...Klein shuddered. He wouldn't wish that kind of thing on ANYONE. "No," he said slowly, "We just...need time." The others nodded, not envying the survivors of Klein's guild.

"We'll take them." Kirito spoke, his arm around Asuna. "Our house is out of the way, and we've got plenty of space on the couches for them to crash."

"Besides," said Asuna, "it was my idea to take them with us in the first place. We should take care of them." She smiled at Kirito.

"And besides," Kirito said, "I still want to know how these guys have MY skill!" Asuna laughed but punched him playfully. "Though ultimately, the decision's up to them." The huddle of SAO players turned and faced Armin, Reiner, and Jean, who still were engrossed in studying the menu of SAO, and their own conversation. When the short one, Armin, became aware of the others expectantly looking at them, a look of embarrassment flashed across his face and he stood up. Jean and Reiner followed suite. "This place you come from, what is it called?"

"Aincrad." Said Kirito, slowly.

"And you've never heard of Titans there, none of you?" Armin asked. They all nodded.

"Then as members of the Scout Regiment," this time Jean spoke "we must go there with you."

"But Jean, the formation... The others probably think we're dead by now..." Reiner said worriedly.

"He's right, Reiner." Armin said softly. "If there is a place where humanity lives free of the Titans, we must find it."

Jean nodded and turned, "So, will you take us there?" He asked, looking every one in the eye.

"That's funny," Asuna replied, "we were just about to ask you to come with us back to Floor 22." When she received blank looks, "our home." The three boys brightened, and eagerly nodded.

"Well, we should be heading back." Kirito said, "The night cycle's almost begun." Armin reached into his brown jacket and pulled out a strange, circular-looking metal object. With horror, Klein realized what it was: a gun! He grabbed his sword, and Kirito pulled Asuna away whilst they both reached for their own weapons, but the boy simply pointed into the air and fired, launching a long green plume into the darkening sky. _Oh, _he thought, _only a flare gun. Still..._"Maybe Eren or Mikasa will see that, so they don't freak out when we don't report in." Armin said.

"Who?" Kirito asked. "More of your Scouts?"

"Yes, and friends. We've known them for years." Jean

Heathcliff raised his hand and motioned for his Knights to return through the "safe zone" entrance to this dungeon or whatever it was, and the white-and-red-clad warriors disappeared with a flash of light and sound through the portal, which once again caused the three Scouts to look unnerved. They recovered much more quickly than before with the menu, though. Meanwhile, Kunimittz ran up to Klein. "We're...ready to go, boss."

"You head on back to the guild house." Klein said. "I'll catch up...I need time to think." His guild mate nodded, and relayed the orders to what was left of Fuurinkazan, and Klein watched his friends march solemnly back through the portal that had caused them so much pain.

"Let's go then, we have a long walk ahead." Asuna said, motioning for the trio to follow her and Kirito, who walked right beside one another, holding hands. Kirito nuzzled Asuna tenderly. Klein was glad that for all the pain Sword Art Online caused, it had at least brought those two some semblance of joy and fulfillment. When he looked at the reactions of the three new guys, however, it almost made him laugh in spite of everything: they were all blushing a furious color of red. When they reached the portal, Armin gazed at the invisible wall that seperated this place from Aincrad, and breathed: "A new land...a land without Titans..." Kirito and Asuna walked through, and after a couple nervous half-steps Jean followed them, and Reiner came after him. Suddenly, Klein heard a faint zipping noise, like a much softer version of when Armin, Jean, and Reiner had used those wierd rope-and-gas devices to attack the bosses, no, the Titans, from the air. Armin, the only one remaining besides him, looked up into the trees, and breathed a name in a soft, suprised voice: "Annie...?"

Klein followed his eyes, and sure enough a short blond girl dressed and equipped identically identically to Armin was standing one on of the tall tree branches at the edge of the clearing, watching them. _She looks like someone I would enjoy getting to know,_ Klein thought mischeviously. However, the girl seemed to notice she was spotted, and soon leapt off the branch and shot away, manuevering through the trees with that strange device of theirs. "No!" Armin called after her, "wait..."Klein sighed, but put his hand in front of Armin, who looked like he was making ready to go after her. He looked saddened and concerned by the girl's sudden appearance, but nodded. The boy turned, and walked through the portal. _Home sweet Aincrad_, Klein thought sadly as he followed him.

Author's Notes: As you noticed this chapter was kinda dialogue-heavy, but trust me the action will return :) Please let me know what you think in a review (an author can't improve their work without feedback after all), and let me know if you want me to keep on going. I am open any suggestions on how this could be improved, my goal is simply to deliver the crossover these two amazing series deserve.


	3. A New World

Author's Notes: As is probably obvious, I am neither Reki Kawahara or Hajime Isayama, and do not own Sword Art Online or Attack on Titan. So yeah, this chapter 3. As you can see, I am having every odd chapter told from an AoT character's perspective (primarily Armin) and every even chapter told from an SAO character's perspective. As ever I love to hear what you all think, good AND bad, in a review. I hope you enjoy Chapter 3!

Year: 850 KS (Kyojin Sekai)

_A land without Titans...A land...where humanity lives free...from the fear of being devoured..._Armin had never imagined such a place could exist. _Could this Aincrad the black-haired boy had mentioned, _Armin thought, _be the place the Scouts have paid so dear to find? _Armin faced the strange portal that the other humans from Aincrad had disappeared through. _Through this thing..._he thought, excitement beggining to course through him, _could lie the key to humanity's salvation! _

However, as he stepped toward the shimmering air at the corner of the clearing, he heard a faint sound of cables retracting at high speed back into their casing, and looked behind him. _Had the Scouts already seen the flare, _he wondered? There was no one at ground level, but as his eyes traveled upwards towards the canopy he gasped. There, standing on the highest branch of the same tree he, Jean, and Reiner had watched the battle between Klein's men and the Titans, was someone he had half expected to never see again. After all, she was in the Military Police, who usually never left the safety of the inner wall they cowered behind, and he was in the Scout Regiment. But still, Armin could swear that the girl looking down at him from the tree was none other than his fellow graduate of the 104th, Annie Leonhart.

Surprised, Armin found himself mutter her name. This drew the attention of Klein, the only other one to not cross through the portal. He seemed to follow Armin's gaze, and he gasped. Annie realize that they had seen her watching them, and jumped a little. She turned, and Armin realized she was leaving. Instinctively, Armin cried out "No! Wait..." She ignored him, or didn't hear, and flew through the forest back to wherever she had come from, her ropes shooting out in front of her through the darkening sky like black swords. Armin reached for the controls of his own maneuvering gear, but Klein put his hand in front of his chest. Armin looked up at the red-haired man, who simply sighed and shook his head. _He's right,_ thought Armin. _Whatever Annie was doing here beyond the walls, she obviously didn't want to speak to me._ He stowed his controls back in his sheathes, and nodded.

Now was the moment he had been both dreading and anticipating for the past 15 minutes: his turn to cross through the portal. Whatever this Aincrad place was, it was definitely strange, filled with things he had never seen before. Like that floating series of boxes with words, that had appeared out of thin air when he had mimicked the black-haired boy and swiped two of his right fingers in front of his face. _What was it they called it, a...menu,_ he remembered. But only one thing really mattered: it was supposedly free of Titans, was a place where they had never even been spoken of. Even if it ended up being something wierd like being also populated with strange, fantastical monsters, if he could exist there without the fear of being eaten alive by a naked giant, Armin would take it. With grim determination, Armin took a step into the shimmering air, and left the world as he knew it.

The first thing Armin noticed upon entering the portal was an odd tingling sensation that started with his feet and worked it's way up his body, until he felt it on every inch of his skin. A fierce, blinding light, like the one when those armored warriors that called themselves the "Knights of the Blood Oath" had first come through the portal, engulfed him, along with the same shrill sound from before. This lasted for what seemed like 30 seconds, during which Armin could neither see nor hear anything. Slowly, the light and sound began to decrease in intensity. When they finally faded completely, he was standing in a forest clearing. _Am I in the same place, _he wondered?

A cursory look around, though, told him he was not. For one, the trees looked completely different, a never-before-seen species perhaps. They were not as tall as the giant trees that seemed to be most common in the abandoned countryside of Wall Maria, but he noted that thankfully that they were definitely of adequate height to fight Titans. Secondly, he was now surrounded by some of the people he had seen enter the portal earlier. While he saw no sign of Klein's red-armored comrades, nor Heathcliff and his white-clad guards, the black-haired boy and the pretty brown-haired girl stood leaning against both each other and a tree, watching him with kind, observant eyes. Off to another side, Jean stood in the middle of the clearing with his hands in his jacket pockets, taking in his new surroundings. His comrade breathed in, and exhaled slowly, evidently enjoying the fresh calm that he was feeling. Meanwhile, Reiner was sitting cross-legged on a nearby log, had his head in his hands again, clearly lost in some worried thought.

"Where are we?" Armin asked slowly. The sunlight glistened through the trees as the faint sound of birds chirping filled the air.

The couple leaning against the tree looked up, and the girl smiled. "Welcome to Aincrad."

"This forest..." Jean asked, "this is Aincrad?" Armin was puzzled too, he had been expecting some buildings or other signs of human habitation. Also, where had all their weapons come from?

"Oh no." The girl giggled cutely, "this forest is just one part of the world of Aincrad."

"The world..." _How big was this place,_ Armin wondered? "How many humans live here...in Aincrad that is?"

The girl thought about it for a second, and her face darkened. She spoke softly: "Only about 6,000 of us are left. Right?" She turned to the boy.

"Yeah." He said darkly. "Thousands have died, ever since Kayaba sealed us in here."

"Sealed you in where, and who's Kayaba?" It sounded like no kind of name Armin had ever heard of before. _Except for..., no, it can't be. According to Eren, all the Orientals are dead except for Mikasa. _But still, Armin couldn't help noticing that the features of these people from Aincrad seemed to share an undeniable resemblance to those of his and Eren's childhood friend and fellow Scout. Meanwhile, the boy opened his mouth to respond, but the girl lightly laid her hand over it and spoke: "Let's not worry about that until we get home, shall we?"

"Home?" Reiner, having finished whatever had been occupying his mind so earlier, said.

"Yes, Heathcliff thought it best that you guys get adjusted for a couple days until we take you to the capital, so we're going to be providing the accommodations. Don't worry, there's plenty of room and the house is by a lake, you'll love it!" She smiled at them, and Armin couldn't help finding himself blushing.

Jean, who was doing the same, spoke: "So we're going to be staying with YOU for a couple days..." He looked like a man who'd just found an oasis.

"And me." The black-haired boy spoke, glaring at Jean whilst holding a hand over one of his two swords, the black one. The message was pretty clear: back off from my girl.

"Oh, don't be so rude to our house guests; we haven't even introduced ourselves!" The girl said.

"I guess so. You go first." He said, sighing and dropping his hand down. His hostile demeanor fully dissipated, the girl smiled and spoke: "I'm Asuna, and this is Kirito."

" I...I...I'm Armin." He said, stuttering.

"Jean. Jean Kirstein"

"Reiner...Braun." Reiner said slowly.

Noticing something strange about their names, Armin spoke: "Do people not have family names in Aincrad?"

Kirito and Asuna looked at each other nervously, and Armin thought he saw something else flash between them as they decided how to answer. _That's strange,_ he thought to himself. "No," Asuna said sadly, "I guess they don't."

Immediately afterwards, the now-familiar blinding light and sound of a portal being activated began again, and when it faded a mournful-looking Klein had joined them. He flipped his fingers in front of his face, and once again the strange thing they called a "menu" appeared hovering in front of him. He tapped one of the options and a long list appeared on the menu. He scrolled through it, but seemed to have no luck in finding whatever it was he was searching for. "Damnit!" He swore, "I'm out of teleport crystals."

"Here!" Kirito said, and tossed a blue rectangular crystal with a odd metal framework surrounding it to Klein. "This one's on the house. Wouldn't want you to have to make the trek all the way back to the warp point."

"Thanks, Kirito." Klein said, catching it with his right hand. Holding it up in the air and staring straight at the sky, he spoke sadly but clearly: "Teleport: Mishe!" Armin gasped as Klein, and Klein alone, was engulfed in the same glow as when one went through the portal, and when the glow faded had vanished.

"What the hell was that?" Reiner exclaimed.

"What? Oh that." Kirito seemed to genuinely find Reiner's lack of knowledge amusing, which annoyed Armin a bit. "These," he said, holding another one up for them to see, "are teleport crystals. They're pretty expensive, but they allow you to send yourself anywhere in Aincrad at a moment's notice."

"Teleportation?" Armin asked, curious. He had no idea how people could posses such power, but guessed it came of being able to make progress without living in fear of the Titans.

"Yes." Kirito said, "And that's how we'll be getting to our house." He reached into his jacket, and Armn saw a quick flash of light. The boy then produced three of the blue crystals, and tossed them to Armin, Jean, and Reiner. The strange object felt cold in Armin's hand, yet he also felt some sort of strange energy coursing through it, contained by the crystal itself. Armin searched the device for some kind of control or button, but found none.

"How does one operate this kind of thing?" Jean asked, taking Armin and Reiner's obvious question from them.

"Like this." Asuna said, and raised a blue crystal of her own above her head. She glanced at Kirito, and he nodded. "Teleport: Coral!" She yelled, and summarily disappeared the same way Klein had just moments before.

"Now it's your turn." Kirito said, nodding at the three Scouts. Armin glanced nervously at Jean and Reiner, who returned the look, each watching to see who would be the first to try. Finally, Jean, sweating but determined, lifted his crystal to the air, and shouted: "Teleport: Coral!". He too was engulfed in a brief flash of light and sound, then disappeared. _It's this,_ Armin thought, _or return to the Scouts empty-handed._ He looked over at Reiner, who saw his intentions and nodded. In unison, they raised their crystals. Armin blinked as the bright sun shone in his eyes, and together they yelled: "Teleport: Coral!"

The blue crystal seemed to be consumed by the bright light that soon filled Armin's vision. _One-time use, huh?_ The odd tingling sensation from before returned, and once again half a minute later he could see and hear again. This time, when he opened his eyes, he gasped. He was standing on top of an ornate stone platform covered in odd, hard-to-make-out symbols, in the middle of what looked like your typical out-of-the-way village. Several people were walking around, going about their ordinary lives. The buildings were small, and made of wood. It was no large settlement, in either size or population: Armin only saw about 20 inhabitants in total. Aside from the wood structures in the center and a low surrounding stone wall, only about 2 meters high, Armin saw several paths beginning in artificial breaks in the wall leading off into the surrounding forest, which seemed much more vibrant than the dark clearing where he had entered Aincrad.

"Hey, Armin!" A familiar voice said, pulling Armin out of his observant glaze. He looked over the other side of the platform, but saw no one. "Down here, are you blind or something!?" He turned back to the front of the platform, and noticed that Jean, Reiner, and Asuna were standing in the shade of a large tree next to one of the paths leading out of the village. He felt a light hand on his shoulder, and looked up to see Kirito standing behind him. "C'mon, you don't want to keep Asuna waiting, trust me. Armin, isn't it?"

"Yes." He said softly, walking down a small set of steps to join up with the others. Together, Asuna and Kirito leading the way and Armin, Jean, and Reiner bringing up the rear, they set off one of the well-worn paths into the seeming wilderness.

After about 45 minutes of walking through the forest, the trees parted to reveal a view that Armin up until then had only dreamed of. Expanding out in front of them was a veridian valley, with soft rolling hills and a little river winding it's way through it. And in the center was the largest lake Armin had ever seen. The sunlight glistened off the calm, deep blue water. He could only imagine how many hundreds of fish might call it home. "It's..." He began, taken aback by the serene splendor in front of him.

"...beautiful." Jean finished, just as breathless.

"You two...live here?" Reiner asked, equally as taken aback. It was sights like this that reminded people just how much the Titans had taken from humanity.

"Uh-huh." said Asuna. "You see that house over there?" She pointed to a medium-sized log house on a hill overlooking the lake. "That's ours." Armin's eyes widened. _These people...so is this what life could be like without Titans,_ he wondered?

After about another 5 minutes of walking, they arrived at the house. Armin half-expected Kirito to knock on the door to let whoever else was inside know they were home, but he simply slid open his menu and produced a key after tapping an option. "I'm never going to get used to them doing that." Jean muttered. Kirito unlocked and opened the door, and they walked inside. The room appeared to be the center of the house, complete with several chairs, a couch, a center table, and a fireplace. It felt like home should feel like. Armin realized with shock that, with the exception of that one time they, along with their friends from the 104th, paid a visit to Jean's mother, this was the first time he had been inside a civilian's home since joining the military. "If you don't mind my asking, who all lives here besides you two?" Jean asked.

"Oh, well, you three for the next couple days, but other than that it's just Kirito and I."

"Just...the two of you?" said Reiner. "Are you two related or something?"

"We're married." Kirito said matter-of-factly. He folded his arms and smiled mischievously at them, as if casually daring them to dispute his statement. Asuna blushed like a tomato.

"Kirito... I thought we were just keeping that fact between us and our friends!?"

"Why? I want the whole world to know how I feel about you." He smiled, and kissed Asuna passionately. She embraced him happily, and Armin glanced to his right, where Reiner and Jean were trying to avert their eyes, embarrassed. _The last time I saw two people in love like that..._Unbidden, painful memories of his training in the 104th and the subsequent horror of Trost flew through Armin's mind. A confident group of cadets, so sure that their three years of training had prepared them for whatever the Titans could throw at them...the paralyzing shattering of that thought as they helplessly watched Thomas get eaten...then, as Armin had stood like a silent statue over the vigil of the Titans feasting on his comrades, his FRIENDS. Mina's screams, Nac shouting for help, Millius charging in only to get grabbed himself...and Eren, staring defiantly ahead to the last from within the Titan's mouth, having saved Armin from the same fate..._No,_ Armin thought to himself, _why are you making me relive this?_ He pulled himself out of his memory, but the sight of Kirito and Asuna, who had just now remembered that they had company and both bore embarrassed expressions as they separated from each other, dragged him back to another memory, another couple, the same age as their hosts, except in this memory the girl was trying to kiss back breath to a body that, Armin knew even back then, would know it no more. _They even look the same age,_ Armin thought horrified. Finally, though he was able to shove the things he had seen all those months ago into the back of his mind and focus.

"So, yeah," Asuna said smiling, "I guess, in lieu of family names, that I'm Mrs. Kirito." She smiled at how ridiculous it sounded. "Anyway, Kirito and I have a FEW THINGS to discuss." The way she said that made Kirito look a little nervous. "So make yourselves comfortable. We'll be in our room until it's time to cook dinner, so just knock if you want anything." She took Kirito by the arm and dragged him into an adjacent hallway. He glanced at the trio with a look that told Armin the boy thought he was in for it. When he turned around, Jean had already sprawled himself over one of the couches, sighing with exhaustion after the long, unforseeable voyage from Wall Rose all the way to this Coral place, in wherever Aincrad was. Armin realized he was exhausted himself, and slowly sank down into the nearest chair.

Suddenly, Armin remembered something he had wanted to mention to Jean and Reiner, but he didn't want to say in front of Kirito and Asuna. "I saw Annie." He said.

"Wh-what? When? Where?" Reiner asked nervously.

"She was in the trees, in that clearing where the portal is...on our end." Armin said slowly. Reiner turned strangely pale for a second, and then drowned it in a serious expression.

"What exactly do you mean, on our end?" Jean asked. "And Annie's in the Military Police, what is she doing on the wrong side of the wall?"

"I don't know what she was doing there, but the minute I saw her she ran off. And, as for the our end thing...I think this isn't part of our world."

"What are you saying, Armin?"

"I think that this place, Aincrad, it's another world entirely. An entire world without Titans. Where Titans never even existed."

Jean's eyes widened. "But they mentioned something about being trapped here, how there's only like 6,000 people left or something. How can a world like this survive with only 6,000 people!?"

"I don't know." Armin said reluctantly. His logic was flawed, but they definitely weren't in any place he had heard of in the old books he had read of the world before the Titans. "But you've seen it too. Those menus, those weird crystals, that Sword Skill thing Kirito was talking about."

"You're right." Jean sighed, as if preparing himself to accept the realization that they really were in another world. He spoke: "And these guys from Aincrad keep referring to this place as something else."

"Yeah. SAO, right?" Armin asked.

Jean nodded. "And while you were still staring at that menu earlier, Kirito mentioned something. SAO is an acronym. It stands for Sword Art Online, whatever the hell that means."

"Sword...Art...Online? Artistry through swords, yes but why call your world that? And what does Online mean?"

"They didn't say. They seemed too shocked we didn't know to answer."

"Either way, something strange is going on. We need to know what exactly is going on here, or coming here was useless. And I get that our hosts don't fully understand this either, and that's why they invited us here." Armin said.

"Alright then." Jean said, and stood up. He looked determined about SOMETHING. He started to walk down the hallway Kirito and Asuna had disappeared down earlier.

"Where are you going?" Armin asked, though he already knew his comrade's answer.

"To get some answers." He responded, and continued walking. Silently, Armin rose and followed him. If _these people, if Aincrad holds the key to humanity's salvation like I think they might,_ the boy thought to himself, _then we have to know._

Author's Notes: I apologize that that Chapter was a bit shorter than the previous two chapters, but in writing this chapter I ended up writing a lot more about their initial arrival than first intended, and my plans for the intended content for chapter 3 had to be moved to chapter 4 (which I will get out as soon as possible), including an action scene considering the past two chapters have mostly been plot/dialogue.), or this you all would have been waiting for 3 times as long for this chapter. Anyway, please let me know what you thought of the chapter in a review, and I will back ASAP with Chapter 4!


	4. Signal Collision (Part 1)

Author's Notes: first and foremost, I would like to apologize for how long this one took. It was a combination of having to deal with my dysfunctional family and getting caught up in the hype of the new season of Sword Art Online (new episodes every Saturday!). Also, after last chapter I swore to not cut another chapter's planned content short because of size, but I ran a bit overboard on this one. That is also why it is split into two parts, for ease of reader use. I love the feedback you guys have been giving me, and I will continue to try and get out new chapters as soon as possible. Please enjoy chapter 4, and tell me what you think in a review!

Year: 2 SAOHI (Sodo Ato Onrain Hatsubai Irai)

_What was Kirito thinking, blurting our relationship out like that?_ Asuna thought angrily as she dragged her husband by his arm back to their bedroom. It wasn't that she didn't enjoy his sudden outburst of affection, but still, in front of their guests? _Kirito IS a loose cannon_, she thought to herself, _in both our relationship and as a player._ Sometimes he was positively stunning, but sometimes she wondered how she had fallen in love with such a klutz. _Then again,_ Asuna thought, _that is part of the reason why I do._

The bedroom door was pushed open and swiftly closed behind them. No need for them to disturb their guests, after all. From what Asuna had seen after the hike from the warp point to their house, plus however long they had been fighting and traveling before Klein's guild had run into them, they were exhausted. Though having just met them, Asuna couldn't help finding their guests interesting. Otherwise, why would she have suggested that she and Kiriro be entrusted with their supervision? The brown-haired boy, Jean his name was, was in particular amusing. By now used to the unfortunate truth that a lot of the male players couldn't take their eyes off her, Asuna had thought the reaction from him when Kirito had explained just HOW unavailable she was had been downright hilarious. Nevertheless, there were things that bothered her about them, even if they were just highly amnesiac players she had originally thought they might be, things that seemed to evidently bother her husband as well. But what was rushing through her mind right now was important to only her and him.

Kirito sat next to her on the bed, looking at her with that cute look he had that sort of reminded her of a puppy that knew from it's master's demeanor it had done something wrong, but was unsure what. She was nervous about what she was going to ask. It was one of the most taboo subjects to talk about in SAO, after all. "Kirito." She said slowly, looking down at the floor "Back there in the forest...something Armin said...made me think about something."

"What is it?" He said, gently taking her hand. He had obviously been expecting some sort of scolding for being more upfront than usual, and she could see him visually relax.

"Well," Asuna said, raising her head to meet Kirito's coal-black eyes, "he asked us about...family names in Aincrad. That just had me thinking, we've promised each other everything, right?" She said, tension rising in her.

"Asuna...I...of course..." He said, his eyes widening as he began to realize just what she meant.

"I know it's not something we're supposed to talk about. The real world is waiting for us, if we ever clear this game...but I want to know...if we were married in that world, with our real names...what would my new family's name be?" She looked at him expectantly. He nervously looked at the bed, then murmured something softly. She frowned, which caused Kirito upon looking up to get that scared puppy look again. Her husband took a deep breath, and said softly: "Kirigaya. My family name is Kirigaya."

"Kirigaya." Asuna said slowly. She could just picture it. "Kirigaya Asuna. I like the sound of it." She said, and kissed him. He was blushing as red as the off color of armor that she had yet to change out of.

Then, he gasped as he realized something. He gazed into her "Asuna...you used your real name as your player ID...?"

"I never really thought about it when I made it...yes. Asuna is my name in the real world as well." Asuna said, gasping herself as she realized that she had never told him, never told anyone other than that accidental conversation with Argo two years ago. _It's been so long since I thought about it. No one else I know uses their real name, not even Kirito,_ she thought to herself. Then, she realized what her last thought actually meant._ Oh my god..._"Kirito." Her husband shifted nervously, realizing what Asuna was about to ask, though his eyes never lost contact. "That's not your real name, is it?"

"No, it's not." He said, looking ashamed at having not told her.

"Hey," she said, placing her other hand on his. "we never thought it was neccasary. Everything in here, in SAO, those are the names we knew each other by. The love we feel is real, but the name I grew to love is Kirito." She smiled slightly, and he seemed to soften. "But still, I want to know."

"It's Kazuto."

"Kazuto. Oh, I see. KIRIgaya kazuTO. KIRITO." _His player name is a portmanteau of his real name, _Asuna realized. _That's actually kinda cute. _

"Yeah. Do you..." He began, but a urgent, knocking hammered on their door. _Now?! Well, I did tell them to knock._ Kazuto, no, he was still Kirito to her, got up to get the door. "Let me." Asuna said softly, rising from the bed. "And yes, I like it." She said. She almost laughed at her husband's relieved expression. "After all we've been through, do you think I'd be put off by a name?"

The knocking grew EVEN MORE insistent. "We're coming!" Kirito yelled, annoyed.

"You know." Asuna said as she walked to the door, "we should probably change out of our combat gear. After all, we have company."

"Oh, uh, yeah." Kirito said, flipping his menu open and scrolling to the Equipped Items section. One by one, his two swords and his coat disappeared in brief white-blue flashes, leaving him dressed in a simple featureless set of a black t-shirt and pants. Asuna flipped through her own menu with one hand whilst reaching for the door with another. Her trusted rapier, Lambent Light, vanished into the virtual ether of the SAO Item Storage System, while her light guild-stylized armor was replaced with her casual attire in the same flash. She opened the door to find Jean, with the short one, Armin standing right behind him. The brown-haired boy began to speak: "Asuna, we have some questions about..." his voice trailed off as he noticed her change in apparel, which promptly earned a chastising glare.

Armin sighed, and finished: "we need to know what exactly Aincrad is." He took a deep breath, and Asuna could tell what he was about to say was important. By this point, Kirito had come up behind Asuna, causing Jean to back off a bit more. "We need to know...because tens of thousands of lives may depend on it." _He says that with such conviction_, Asuna thought to herself. _Is their amnesia really that bad that they don't know that there are less than ten thousand players left in SAO? Or that this is even a virtual world?_

"I have an idea: We'll fill you guys in on Aincrad, but I'm hungry, so can we do that over dinner? Asuna here's a master chef." Kirito said, putting him arm around her. While she appreciated the compliment, Asuna could tell that Armin and Jean did not like whatever perceived matter of importance they had to discuss being demoted to dinner conversation. Noticing their doubt himself, he added:"And she's making her Meat Surprise tonight, isn't that right Asuna?" He glanced at her and winked. She just sighed at her husband's antics, but surprisingly they seemed to have an effect on their guests. Jean appeared about to faint from happy surprise, and while Armin kept himself composed, he softly asked: "Meat? Did you say you have...meat? We haven't had meat in 5 years...since Shiganshina fell."

_Kirito knows there is no such dish called "Meat Surprise", somehow he knew they were craving some meat. Ah well, _thought Asuna, _guess I'm making a meat dish tonight. Now, what to make?_ Deciding on a venison stew, she turned to their guests. "Dinner should be ready in about 20 minutes, you really should rest until then. If what I saw back there in that forest was any indicator, you guys have had a rough day." The returned looks conveyed a definite you-have-no-idea. The two nodded, and Armin and Jean walked back to the living room. Asuna then turned to Kirito and pinned him against the hallway wall.

"What!?" He asked, returning to the hurt puppy look.

"Now that we've told each other, I want to know. Is there anything else you're not telling me?" She asked, trying to be serious, though she could feel a playful look cross her face.

"N...no! What, do you think I'm hiding something?" He responded.

"You knew they wanted meat, how could you have known that?"

"I overheard Jean talking with Reiner on the way here, when they saw a deer-type monster in the forest between here and the warp point. That's all."

"Eavesdropping, huh?" Asuna asked, sighing even as she asked as she knew the answer. Kirito nodded. "That's rude, you know." She smirked when he got a hurt look, "Now, if you'll excuse me, thanks to you I have a stew to make."

After about 25 minutes, the stew was ready. Asuna missed cooking in the real world a little. While it was a lot easier in SAO having your pound of deer meat disappear in a flash and rematerialize as neat little chunks the minute you applied your knife, it took a bit of the fun out of it. In either case, she had miscalculated the correct flavor replication time to get the right flavor for cooking the potatoes, and it had taken the girl a little while longer than her estimate. So when Asuna finally carried the steaming pot to the table, the four boys were already sitting around waiting for her.

Since Asuna and Kirito only had three chairs, her husband had had to pull over one of the couches from the living room, upon which Reiner and Jean were seated. Armin had taken the third chair next to the couch at one end of the table, which was for if Liz or Agil or Klein stopped by. Asuna had wanted more chairs when they were buying from the furniture merchant NPCs in Algade for their new house, but Kirito had reminded her that they had already blown most of their reserve Col on the house itself. So instead, next to Armin on the right of the table was a couch for their other two guests to sit on. Kirito sat, his hands folded back behind his head in relaxed anticipation of the meal, on Armin's left, where he pulled out the final empty chair for her to sit. Asuna placed the food down and obliged.

As she pulled the lid off the pot, she recieved several joyous sighs from their guests as the smell of meat flooded their nostrils. She noticed, somewhat annoyed, that they were still wearing their green cloaks. "Why don't you take off your cloaks, they look like they could get hot in here, and you wouldn't want to get food on them would you?" She asked.

Armin, looking somewhat embarrased, responded, "We tried but..." He tugged on the cloak as if to pull it off as one would in the real world, "...we can't. What is this?"

Asuna giggled a little, though a darker thought crossed her mind. _Just how much of their memory could they have lost to not even know how to operate the basic SAO user interface? "_You don't take off clothes like that in SAO, Armin. Open your menu and tap the minus sign on the gear you want to remove under Equipped Items."

Armin just stared at her blankly, his eyes like saucers, trying to comprehend what the girl meant. Then he opened his menu, scrolled until he found the Equipped Items screen, and gasped. "All the stuff with me, it's right here!" He exclaimed. Jean and Reiner opened their own menus and looked, themselves looking surprised at the list in front of them. They seemed to be getting over the initial shock of the menu itself though.

Out of the corner of her eye, Asuna noticed Kirito looking over Armin's shoulder at the boy's items. "Here," he said, pointing at one of the items, "Scout Regiment Cloak. Is this it?" Armin nodded, and tapped the button to de-equip it. His green cloak vanished into thin air with the trademark blue flash of SAO.

The boy blinked at where his cloak had once been, and then again. "What's this?" Kirito asked, bringing Armin out of his shock. Kirito was indicating another one of his items.

"Kirito..." Asuna sighed. While she was just as curious about their strange guests, she was a little annoyed at his actions, given how rude it was to look at another player's menu without their permission.

"That's our manuevering gear." Armin said, indicating the metal boxes slung to their sides that Asuna noticed they still had out. He tapped the item Kirito had indicated, and they too vanished. This prompted worried looks from Jean and Reiner. _Do we really have to explain everything?_ wondered Asuna.

"Don't worry, anything you de-equip can be retrieved later from the same menu." Kirito said, which though it looked like it caused their even more puzzlement reassured Reiner and Jean enough that they also removed their cloaks and gear. Finally, they began to eat.

After about 5 minutes of silent feasting though, Jean spoke: "That...this is the best food I've eaten since I joined the army."

"Given all you've said earlier, I assume you don't mean the Aincrad Liberation Force when you say the Army?" Kirito asked. Seeing it not likely given their level of knoweledge in SAO, Asuna doubted it, but she hoped not just in case. The ALF, often referred to simply as the Army, was infamously dictatorial in it's rule of the lowest floors.

"Liberation Force? No, I've never heard of it. And liberation from what?" Jean said. The others shook their heads, having never heard of it either.

"You said someone named...Kayaba...trapped you all somehow." Armin said, stuttering a little. "Is that what they are trying to liberate you from?"

"That's what they say, anyway." Asuna said softly. "But for over a year now they seemed to have given up on trying to clear the game." _We haven't seen any Army members on the frontlines since Floor 54. Except, she thought, for that suicidal attack on the 74th Floor Boss. If Klein, Kirito, and I hadn't been there..._ Asuna shuddered.

"Clear...the game?" Armin asked, looking utterly without comprehension, "what do you mean by game?"

"SAO, of course." Asuna replied. _Oh wait, they don't know this is a game... _She thought, horrified at the door she realized she had just opened.

"And, I want to know NOW," Jean said, the atmosphere at the table growing very serious, "what is SAO?"

Asuna opened her mouth to respond, but Kirito beat her to it. "Sword Art Online, or SAO for short, is the world's first fully-realized virtual reality video game. At least, it was supposed to be a game."

"Virtual reality...video game...what does that mean?" Armin asked, his expression telling Asuna he knew he wouldn't like the answer.

"This world...these bodies...everything...it's not real. It's just a simulation in our heads. There's this thing...called a Nervegear...you out it over your head like this," Kirito said, miming an action every SAO player had done two years ago and almost all had come to regret, "and it sends and recieves signals from your brain, making the world you see, hear feel, and interact with the virtual one of SAO."

"And you're saying," Jean said, looking horrified at the prospect yet skeptical, "that we are all in this Sword Art Online game?"

"Yes." said Asuna "Do you really remember nothing at all? Nothing about the real world?"

"What I remember" Reiner's low voice finally spoke, "is my entire life living in fear of the Titans. My fifteen years of life." _They're only 15 and already in some sort of military, or at least they think so, _Asuna thought._ When I was 15, my biggest concern was doing well on the national examinations, not being a soldier...at least, until I put the Nervegear on...then, like them it seems, it was survival... _Seeing a pattern in the the words of their guests, Asuna asked a question: "What are Titans?"

Jean and Reiner both grew pale. "So...it's true...you really don't know..." Jean said, visibly shaking.

Slowly, Reiner spoke: "Titans are giant creatures that look like horribly misshapen humans, who seem to exist for the sole purpose of killing humans."

"They kill their prey..." Armin said, shuddering even as he thought about it, "by eating them." _Oh God,_ Asuna thought. A_nd...as much as I want to not believe what they say and put it down to the amnesia...what Klein said, and the way he was acting after we came through the portal...what he must have seen...could these Titans be real?_ She visbily tensed.

If anything, her husband looked even more mortified. "And if what Klein said to me back in the clearing is true," Kirito said, growing more scared by his own train of thought each second, "they are almost impossible to kill conventionally. Is that true ?"

"Yes." They all said simultaneously, then looked surprised at each other.

"As a measure of fighting skill, how does Klein and his...guild compare with the other humans in...SAO?" Armin asked, finally starting to accepts some, though not the, facts of what seemed to him the utterly impossible reality of being in a VRMMO.

"While they are not as elite as the Knights of the Blood Oath under Commander Heathcliff you met earlier," Kirito responded, "I've known Klein since the start of this death game and he, along with his guild Fuurinkazan which he trained himself, are some of the fiercest fighters in all of SAO, and have been on the front lines for a while now."

"Then, if the Titans came here, to Aincrad," Armin said, seeming saddened by his own words, "most of you would probably die." _While these Titans sound terrifying_, Asuna thought, _I'm actually a bit hurt. Does Armin really think this low of our fighting skill? _

Kirito was obviously thinking the same thing. "Hey!" He shouted, "we've survived in here trapped in SAO for two years against every type of monster Kayaba's thrown at us! These Titans can't be that much different!"

"Three years." Jean said in a quiet voice.

"What?" Asuna asked.

"Three years." He said again. "That's how long our Cadet Corps, the 104th, trained for the military. For three years we were trained for the sole purpose of fighting and killing Titans, to protect humanity. We thought we were ready." He shook his head, as if still ashamed of such naive thinking. "A couple months ago, a day before our graduation, the Titans attacked the city of Trost, my hometown. Along with the main strength of the Garrison Regiment in that section of Wall Rose, our class of about 200 cadets were sent into battle, as part of the support wave." _The way he's talking,_ Asuna thought, _they were slaughtered weren't they?_

"Thomas Wagner was the first casualty..." Armin began. Asuna realized that there were tears welling in his eyes from the memory. "A variant Titan came out of nowhere and swallowed him whole. Then...it broke into chaos. I was paralyzed from fear atop a building where my squad was. I..." Armin's voice raised into a shout, "watched as the Titans devoured them all!" There was a clatter as Kirito dropped his spoon. Asuna felt her mouth hang agape in horror, imagining it. The screams, the terror...

"Of the 200 or so members of the 104th sent into battle..." Jean said, " less than 70 returned alive from Trost."

"Three years, and you were still annihilated?!" _This can't be true,_ thought Asuna. _There's no way this amnesia or memory replacement or whatever. It's just too intricate, too real. And Kirito trusts Klien, and if Klein saw these Titans on the other side of that portal, then they must be real._ An utterly horrifying thought then crossed Asuna's mind. _If these three could come through the portal, those Titans might be able to as well... A series of possible outcomes flashed through her head. Algade in flames. A group of civilian players backed against a wall, a massive shadow bearing down on them. The valley where their house was filled with massive nondescript humanoids. Kirito, locking eyes with her...from within a giant's mouth. _

"We told you what the Titans were; be glad your world is free of them." Armin said. "Now, I want you to explain. If this is a...virtual reality...which you seem to not want to be in, can't you just exit or something?"

"No." said Kirito. Asuna was glad he was taking that one, she was still recovering from the images in her head. They kept reverberating, over and over, despite how much she wanted them not to. "Sword Art Online was the first game designed to be played entirely in a mentally-generated virtual reality. Asuna and I along with 9,998 other players who at the time called themselves lucky for scoring one, were able to get copies before the first day, so that we could play immediately when the game server first activated. However, the game's creator, a man named Akihiko Kayaba, disabled the logout function, which would have allowed us to detach our minds from our game forms, called avatars," he waved his hands over his body for emphasis, "and resume our normal lives in the real world."

"From what little I understand of it from what you've said," Armin began, "couldn't someone from what you call the real world remove the Nervegear from your body?"

"Kayaba anticipated that, and set it so any attempt to disconnect it from the outside once he sent the code to seal us in would result in the Nervegear's power source to destroy our brains, killing us. Also, you know the concept of a game being fun is because unless you are gambling or something there are no real consequences, right?"

"I guess so, yeah..." Armin said.

"In most games, if you're defeated you just restart or quit, but in SAO...Kayaba madre it so that if your avatar dies, your real body will suffer the same fate is if someone had tried to remove the Nervegear."

"Still," Jean said, "that doesn't sound so bad. Without Titans around what could possibly be that big a danger?"

"This is a game about combat, usually with a sword. Hence the name Sword Art Online. Other than the player vs. player combat through usually non-fatal honor duels, in order to get stronger one has to go out in the wilderness and fight dangerous creatures created by the SAO system. But many people have been outfought, run out of crystals or weapons, or simply walked into a trap." Kirito's expression grew more pained, from an old memory he had shared with Asuna and no one else. "In the two years since Kayaba turned Sword Art Online into a game of life or death, 4,000 players have left both this world and the real one...forever."

"But why would they risk themsleves like that if they know that they might die?"

"Because for every monster another player slays instead of you, that betters their chance for survival and decreases yours, thanks to the limited rescources of these types of games. And becuase every player wants to return to the real world, to the lives we left behind when we put on the Nervegear. Kayaba said the only way to break the seal would be to clear, or defeat, all the boss monsters, which are very hard to kill and require increasing levels of skill and equipment to slay, in Sword Art Online."

"And these boss creatures, how deadly are they to humans?"

"Klein first described the Titans when I came through the portal as if they were minor field bosses, which he thought they were at the time. A minor field boss is the easiest type to slay, but engaging one alone is usually suicide. In total, there are over a hundred bosses in Aincrad, the worst of which are Floor bosses."

"There are thousands of Titans." Armin said quietly. Kirito let out a quiet gasp. "In our world, humanity only managed to survive this long by cowering behind our massive Walls, which I mentioned earlier, that even the Titans cannot normally get through."

"You talk about it as if it's the entire human race, just how many people are in your world, and how big is it?" Asuna asked. _While my theory about their amnesia seems less and less likely to be right, they seem terrified of these Titans and for good reason. The way Armin asked if there were Titans in Aincrad, I think he has an idea if how we can help them. I want to know what that is. _

"There are just over a million humans left behind the Walls."

"One mi-million?!" Kirito spluttered. If the conversation had been less serious in nature, Asuna might have laughed. _A...million people...if they were able to enter SAO they must be from some sort of virtual world, but one with a million people, does that even exist?_ "I...think I've lost my appetite for now."

"Now those are words I never thought I'd ever hear you say, Kirito." Asuna, said, chuckling nervously. It did little to defuse the visible tension that had arisen from the conversation. _If this is...real,_ though Asuna, we've both just stumbled into worlds other than our own.

Looking a little pale, Reiner pushed his plate away. "I think I have as well."

"Yes," Jean said nervously, "thank you for the wonderful food, Asuna, but I think we need time to process." Armin nodded his agreement, and their three guests stood up. They looked to Asuna, and sighing, she nodded. _We did just drop the game bomb, after all,_ she thought. _But they're not the only ones with unanswered questions. What kind of virtual world did they come from? A million people...Titans...and they keep insisting this is the real world..._

Author's Notes: Once again, thank you for your patience and I hope you enjoyed it. Seeing as I got so much done writing from one POV and technically one chapter sequence, I split it into two chapters here for ease of reading. So please by all means leave a review and advance to part 2!


	5. Signal Collision (Part 2)

Author's Notes: I forgot the semi-mandatory disclaimer last time, so here it is: I am neither Reki Kawahara or Hajime Isayama, and therefore do not own either Sword Art Online or Attack on Titan. Other than that, same story from last Author's Notes, so keep reading, and be sure to leave a review or send me your thoughts via PM after you are done!

Year: 2 SAOHI (Sodo Ato Onrain Hatsubai Irai)

They cleaned up from dinner in silence. It simply allowed it to sink in for Asuna. _Somehow, somewhere, there is a virtual reality that contains a million people who think it is real. And the Titans..._the way they talked about them, something in Asuna's gut told her they existed. _After all, there were creatures far more belonging in the realm of fantasy in SAO. But who would create such terrifying creatures?_ As the last plate was washed and stowed, Asuna started walking back to the bedroom unconsciously, still transfixed by the questions that the newcomers and the existence of their world posed.

She wasn't paying attention to where she was walking, and bumped into Kirito. The black-haired boy bent down and put her arm over his shoulder, and together they went to their bedroom. Asuna realized how drained she felt, and clumsily climbed into her bed. Kirito sat beside her. "A million people." He said softly.

"From the way they talked about it," Asuna said, "there were a lot more, but they were all..."she shuddered at the mere thought of what they said Titans did to humans. "It's been that way for years...whatever virtual world they are from obviously isn't a game, and isn't something known to the public."

"Yeah," Kirito said, getting up to lay down in his own bed, "SAO was supposed to be the first. We've been stuck in here for two years, but they've been living in fear for all that time..."

"And we thought we had it bad." Asuna said. _Especially for me,_ she thought. _If it weren't for SAO, I wouldn't have met Kirito. I probably would have been a good little girl and married Sugou like my parents wanted me to. _Asuna didn't even want to think about THAT disgusting individual. Already on unpleasant matters, her mind wandered back to the vision that had gotten her so nervous earlier. Players under attack by giant humanoid creatures, and the screams, the terror. "Kirito," she said softly, "if they could get here from their own world, don't you think those Titans could come through as well?"

"There's probably some sort of barrier preventing them from entering, or those ones Klien fought would have come through." He said. Asuna breathed a deep sigh of relief."If they do come through though," Kirito said, looking at her, "I'll kill every single one before I let anything happen to you."

"If I leave any alive for you, that is." She said, teasing him. After a little while, they both fell asleep. Armin's half-shout half-scream woke them up.

As they both got dressed, Kirito still somewhat asleep like he usually was when he got up, Jean's now-familiar frantic knocking sounded at their door. "What is it?" inquired Kirito groggily, "it's 6 in the morning!" He opened the door, and Asuna could make out the faint outline of a menu icon flashing in front of Jean's face.

"What the hell is this!" The boy exclaimed, pointing to the floating yellow icon. What is that doing there, wondered Asuna. That's the...

"It's the alert icon. It pops up whenever someone sends you an urgent Message." Kirito said. "Here, tap it to bring up the message." _But who in SAO would be messaging them? The only people who know they exist are the Knights and Fuurinkazan. Unless someone else from their world crossed over as well... _

Jean tapped the icon with his finger, and a message appeared in front of him. Asuna looked over his shoulder and saw Armin standing behind him. Jean read the message, and he backed away, in shock. "How...did they come through after us? Did they come after that flare you sent?" He turned to Armin, who read the message out out loud, his expression contorting into one of shock or fear. "Where are we! Armin, Jean, Reiner! Save us! From Sasha!?" He looked stunned, as if he recognized the name.

"Who is Sasha?" Kirito asked.

"One of our friends. They were on the same expedition we were on when we found Aincrad..."

_So it's someone from their world. But if they're in SAO, and they are calling for help..._"Kirito," Asuna said, "we need to get to that portal."

"Right." They turned to Jean and Armin. "We think your friend may have crossed over. If they go just wandering around on that floor..."

"They're in serious danger." Asuna finished. Then she noticed something. "Where's Reiner?!"

"He probably ran off on his own...when he saw the message." Armin said.

"That impatient..." Jean growled.

"He'll likely be fine. This floor isn't dangerous." Kirito said. Asuna was a little irritated at his response, but she agreed. More people obliviously crossing into SAO from Armin and Jean's world took priority. "If they managed to accidentally sent a message for help throught the alert system, it must be pretty bad up there. We'll need to use crystals." Kirito said, tossing the blue teleport items to Jean and Armin. Asuna nimbly clicked through her inventory, bringing out one of her own as well as equipping her battle gear. Her rapier once again rested against her body in it's sheath like a good friend. They raised the teleport crystals high above their heads, and cried in almost unison: "Teleport: Collina Forest!"

The familiar blinding light as they were teleported up the 52 floors between them and their destination faded to reveal the woods they had visited yesterday. _Where we discovered we weren't alone in this virtual world, _Asuna thought, _and where we lost friends. _Asuna had only gotten to know Fuurinkazan from when Klein had invited her and Kirito to a party to celebrate their defeat of the 74th Floor Boss a week ago, but they had seemed like good friends, good people. And for two of them, their lives were claimed by Kayaba, just like the 4,000 other SAO players whose avatars had shattered into a million polygons, just beyond this forest.

"What time does it say you received that message?" Kirito said, his two swords out, turning to Armin and Jean, who were fumbling with the menu to get their own weapons out. Armin was shaking a little, Asuna saw, and went to help him.

"Here." She said, indicating the pouch where recently unequipped items went. The short boy nodded, and opened it, tapping each of his items. In a series of flashes, he and Armin donned their cloaks, along with that odd set of canisters and wires and their twin swords. Though by now it was explained by their being from a different system with apparently different rules, Asuna still noticed out of the corner of her eye her husband getting a flash of annoyance that they were dual-wielding as well.

"About...10 minutes ago." Jean said, answering Kirito's earlier question.

"Then they shouldn't be far." Kirito said. "Let's head for the portal," he said, and pointed his Elucidator in the direction of the portal. All of a sudden, Asuna felt the ground shake under her feet, the others noticed it too. Armin and Jean seemed to have grown very pale all of a sudden. A mix of sounds emitted from the direction of the portal. A strange rumbling, similar to some large thing stomping. _A boss,_ Asuna thought, _or...no...it can't be._ There was also a very loud zipping noise, along with what sounded like a girl's scream. And they all seemed to be coming...closer.

"What is that sound-" Kirito began, but was interrupted when among the tree line the screaming girl broke into view. She appeared to be wearing the same uniform as Armin and Jean, and Asuna finally realized what the weird canisters and rope boxes they carried were for. The girl fired ropes into the trees, swinging around through the air and catapulting herself toward them. A steady stream of gas came out of the mechanism on her back, acting as an extra propellant. She slung herself rapidly, as if attempting to escape something_. I can't imagine the training it took to learn how to use that thing,_ Asuna thought as she stared in surprise. The oncoming girl finally seemed to notice them. Unfortunately both for her and them, the surprise of seeing the people on the ground caused her to miss her next shot with the ropes, and she plummeted to the forest floor. She at least had the sense to try and use the gas to slow herself down, but it had little effect. "I've got you!" Kirito cried, putting himself in heir trajectory to try and catch her...only to be knocked on his back when she landed.

"Kirito!" Asuna cried, running over to him. His HP bar, thankfully, seemed practically full. Though seeming a little dizzy he took her hand and she helped him up. Armin and Jean were helping the girl up, who seemed largely fine as well.

"Sasha, are you ok?" Jean asked.

"Armin, Jean, and...where's Reiner?" Sasha asked.

"The idiot ran off earlier." Jean said, shaking his head. "Why were you calling for help?"

"Because," Armin said slowly, fear creeping into his voice, "we need to run too."

"What do we need to run from? I don't see anything." Kirito asked, looking around.

Armin pointed in the direction of the portal, and their heads turned just in time to see a massive shape burst through the trees, advancing toward them. Asuna's eyes widened as she took in the monster. It was like no enemy she had seen in SAO, no fantastical creature or rabid wild animal. No, what faced them was both a hundred times more human and yet a hundred times less human than that. It stood approximately 8 meters tall, and had the vague appearance of a naked male human, though Asuna noted almost sarcastically to herself that it was lacking in the department of genitalia. The creature had a horrifying, crazed expression on it's face,which appeared stretched to hideous proportions. "Is that a..." Asuna began, scared of what the answer might be.

"Yes." Jean said, equally terrified. "That is..."

"A Titan." Armin finished, obviously trying (and failing) to contain the fear that boiled inside him.

"Kirito, no!" Jean cried, and Asuna realized with horror that he had charged the Titan, a determined look on his face. Asuna saw his twin blades glow, and the Titan's hand went flying in one fell strike. However, she saw saw it's other hand coming down...

"Kirito!" She screamed, and the boy looked up just in time to dive out of the way of the Titan's grasp.

"Is that all you've got!?" He shouted, mocking the creature, but was sent flying by a swipe. Asuna looked in shock. _The Titan's had was still up in the air, how?_ Then she saw. It was the hand that Kirito had severed mere seconds ago that had done the deed. _The Titans are almost impossible to kill,_ Asuna remembered, thinking back to the conversation last night. _Is this what they meant? _

Snapping out of her stunned silence, she saw that the monster was reaching for the crumpled form of Kirito. _I won't let anything hurt you._ Asuna was not a girl who said such things lightly. She unsheathed Lambent Light, the rapier gleaming in the sun. She ran at the Titan, but a number of loud bursts and zipping noises behind her told her she was not alone.

Armin, Jean and Sasha all flew at the Titan, blades out. Jean sliced his blades into the hand, but they seemed to not sink deep enough, as the Titan merely shrugged it off. With it's other hand, it grabbed Jean's ropes. He seemed to panic, attempting to slice off the ropes the Titan had caught, but the monstrosity yanked him through the air toward it, so all his slices missed. _It's pulling him into it's mouth_, Asuna realized with horror. _Is it going to eat him?_ She pivoted, trying to save him now that it's attention was no longer on Kirito, but the arm was out of her reach. "Let him go, you monster!" She hear Sasha scream. The girl had been going for it's other arm, but she shot a rope into opposite trees and changed direction, her green cloak fluttering as she flew towards Jean. She sliced through the ropes that had doomed him, and Jean fell to the ground, but free and away from the Titan. So focused was Sasha on saving him, however, that she brushed hard against a nearby branch, and her gas canisters were knocked loose. _It's only Armin and me,_ Asuna realized. However, the blond boy soon tumbled to the ground next to Kirito, grasping his leg in pain. Asuna didn't see how he has been injured, but she could tell he was down for the fight. _But how? _Avoice in the back of her mind wondered._ You're not supposed to receive actual injuries or bleed in a virtual reality. At least not SAO._

It's attackers all apparently dispatched, the Titan once again turned it's attention to Kirito, who still lay crumpled and stunned on the ground. However, between it and it's intended prey stood Asuna. She glared angrily at the Titan, rapier pointed directly at it's face. "Kirito is MINE! I will not let you hurt him!" She yelled at the creature. However, the Titan's permeanantly-scrunched face seemed to wear only bred expression, as if ignoring the outburst from the small human in front of it. _I have to kill it,_ Asuna thought. _No matter what, I have to kill it. Otherwise..._she glanced back at Kirito, then Jean, then Sasha, then Armin, then back at Kirito. _Otherwise, we all die. _"The...back." Asuna looked down and saw Armin staring at her, trying to say something.

"What?"

"The back...of the neck. A deep enough strike there is the...only way...to kill a Titan." He said, wincing as he did. _The back of the neck, huh? But to get up there.._.All of a sudden, Asuna had an idea. Bracing herself, she turned back to the Titan. The creature's hand shot out, as if to grab her, but Asuna expertly stabbed it's open hand with her rapier in a fury of strikes, severing the fingers. She then lept up onto the arm. Asuna almost cried out at how hot the steam emitting from the Titan's wounds felt. She ran up the arm, and jumped up into the air as it tried to brush her off or grab her with it's other hand. With a cold determination, she aimed herself so as to fall on the back of the Titan's neck, and pointed her rapier in front of her. Executing a stabbing Sword Skill, she angled into a dive, and felt the raw sense of satisfaction from killing a monster in SAO come over her as Lambent Light sunk into the flesh of the Titan's weak spot like a hot knife through butter. A spray of blood narrowly missed her face from the wound, but she clung on as the Titan crumpled to the ground.

Pulling her sword out from the steaming corpse of the Titan, Asuna saw that it too was covered in blood. She opened her inventory and found a rarely-used item that she had kept on hand just in case ever since that one time months ago where Kirito had gotten sick: a handkerchief. With it, she cleaned her blade, until it's familiar sheen appeared once more. However, the corpse took this opportune moment to shatter into polygons like all dead or destroyed objects in SAO, which caused her to fall to the ground. A familiar hand reached down to help her up, and she was face-to-face with Kirito. He kissed her. She embraced him, and they held on for what seemed like forever. "Don't worry." He whispered in her ear. "I'm still in one piece. Thanks to you."

"Just...don't do anything that reckless again, ok?" she said. "You had me scared for a few minutes there." He's really ok, she thought as she sighed with relief.

"You too." He said.

"I'm not losing you...Kazuto." She held him tighter.

After a minute, though: "Asuna?"

"Yes?"

"I...can't breath..." A little embarrased, she let go of him. Toghether, they helped up Armin, who had not recovered quite yet. He was looking at her with a new sense of respect. Asuna noticed that Sasha and Jean looked similarly amazed. They opened their mouths to speak, but they were interrupted by a sound from the direction of the portal.

"Was that a gunshot?" Asuna asked. Suddenly a bright green flare broke through the trees in the area near the portal, soaring ever higher into the sky.

"Mikasa!" Sasha exclaimed. "She came through!"

"Mikasa?" Armin asked. "She's here?"

"Yeah! Eren almost went after you himself last night when you and the others didn't check in, but Commander Erwin forbade it or something. Anway, Mikasa and I saw your flare yesterday, so we decided to sneak out and check it this morning! I'm so glad you're alive! But, who are you?" Sasha explained, turning to Asuna and Kirito as she finished.

"I'm Kirito, said her husband, "and this is Asuna."

"They don't look like Scouts." Sasha said, curious. "What are they doing beyond the wall, Armin?"

"That's a long story-" he began, but was interrupted as a loud zipping noise indicated the arrival of another Scout, this time a girl with dark bangs and a red scarf wrapped around her neck in addition to what Asuna by now assumed was the usual Scout uniform.

"But it can wait until later, Armin." She said. Asuna could sense a coldness coming off this girl, and something about her appearance, even aside from the scarf, didn't match up with that of the other Scouts. She also noticed Sasha glancing between her and the newcomer as if noticing something odd.

"Mikasa..." Jean said.

"Where's Reiner?"

"We...don't know."

"Then we'll have to leave him here." She said sadly.

"Leave him? But why?"

"I don't know what that shimmer in the air we just came through is, but on the other end Titans are swarming the clearing for some reason." Armin's eyes widened. "They can't seem to get through, the shimmer or portal or whatever seems to have some sort of cover that prevents anything over 3 meters from coming through."

"But," Jean said, " we just slew an 8-meter that was chasing Potato Girl here." _Potato girl? _

"That one seems to have gotten through because it jumped after her on it's stomach and it was short enough then to fall through." Asuna and Kirito both breathed noticeable sighs of relief. Aincrad was safe. "Still, if we want to make it back to the Scouts alive..."

"We have to leave now." Armin said. When Jean looked ready to protest, he said: "Jean, we've discovered a land, no, a world, without Titans. We can't let this information die with us, it could save humanity!"

"Don't worry." Asuna said, putting her hand on Jean's shoulder, "we'll find him and keep him safe until you guys get back here." Though visibly still frustrated at having to leave his comrade behind, Jean nodded, and together the Scouts walked back to the portal.

"We should follow them, make sure they make it to the portal. Ok?" Kirito asked, to which Asuna nodded. She had gotten to like Armin and Jean. They followed the Scouts at a distance, and when the time came for them to walk through the portal, they waved goodbye to the Scouts.

"Good luck!" Asuna shouted.

"Slay some Titans for me, will you?" Kirito yelled. Though she couldn't tell if they heard them, Sasha and Armin both waved back, before they walked through the portal and disappeared in a burst of light and sound.

They stood there, gazing at the portal for about 5 minutes in silence. Finally, Kirito spoke, turning to her. "At least we're safe. That blocker or shield or whatever it is keeps the Titans away." He took her hand, his warm touch feeling as real as anything in the real world.

"Yeah." Asuna said, though the images of an Aincrad ravaged by Titans, of Kirito and her being devoured, still lingered in the back of her mind. Suddenly, however, she noticed a flash of energy out of the cornered her eye.

"What the hell?" Kirito said, staring at the shimmer. Once again, Asuna saw it shudder, as if something were pressing against it. The shimmer flickered, with ones and zeros flashing over it. Then it stopped. Instinctually, Asuna started to back away, tugging Kirito long with her. "Asuna, what is it?"

"Kirito, get away from that thing!" She cried, and he obliged, and they started walking backwards away from the portal. An ear-splitting whine filled their ears, and then a massive roar, as if something huge were approaching at very high speed. Asuna looked around, but saw nothing out of the ordinary besides the portal. Then, the portal shattered into a million polygons, and a huge blast of force knocked Asuna and Kirito back. Her head hit a tree, and she blacked out.

When she came to, the sky wasn't it's normal facsimile of the sky in the real world, but it's normal appearance covered in ones and zeros. Asuna looked around, and saw that EVERYTHING was covered in ones and zeroes, including her clothes, her very skin. After a few seconds, they faded, and everything seemingly returned to normal. Then Asuna saw the portal.

Where there had once been the slight shimmer in the air, there was now a giant, permanent gleaming light, along with the shrill sound that had heralded the portal activating in the past continuously repeating. And, in front of it, was the largest Titan Asuna had ever seen, twice the size of the one she had slain earlier. It's appearance was nothing like the previous Titan either. While it's skin had seemed at first glance soft and the Titan had appeared in Asuna's opinion a bit overweight even for a Titan, this one looked lean and muscular, and it's skin looked more like thick plate armor than skin. And there was something about it, Asuna wasn't sure how she could tell, that unlike everything she had seen and heard about them, that made this Titan seem...intelligent. It broke into a run, heading off away from them. _Towards the town,_ Asuna realized with fear. "Asuna!" She turned, and Kirito was next to her, helping her up. "We have to get out of here!" He pointed, and Asuna's eyes widened in horror. Pouring through the portal into SAO...were countless Titans.

_No,_ she thought, _please let this be a dream. _Once again, the terrifying images returned to the front of her mind. _It's going to happen,_ she realized, terrified. Sure, she had been able to slay a Titan, but that had been through incredible luck and sheer rage...and she was one of the best players in Sword Art Online. In a fight agains just one Titan, she, along with Kirito and the others, had nearly died. _The SAO players...are going to be devoured by Titans. _

"We...have to warn the commander about this." She said, trying to control her emotions. Kirito nodded, and together they drew teleport crystals. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw three of the Titans spot them, and as they charged she and Kirito yelled at the top of her lungs: "Teleport: Granzum!" Together, they were enveloped in the characteristic blinding flash of light and sound, and disappeared from the forest.

They appeared on the elaborate steel platform that was Granzum's warp point. Around them, crowds of people were standing around talking.

"Did you see those numbers over everything a minute ago?"

"Phew, I thought it was just me!"

"I wonder what it was, some kind of patch or something?" _They have no idea, _Asuna thought, scared. Then she noticed something dripping down heir right hand, which she had used to break her fall agains the tree from the blast earlier.

"The Titans...they've invaded Aincrad..." Kirito breathed, as if he were trying not to believe it.

"Kirito..." Asuna said, nervousness creeping into her voice.

"What is it, Asuna?" He turned, and then gasped at what he saw. Something that should have been impossible, was known to be impossible, in Sword Art Online. Despite that, neither he nor Asuna could deny it as blood dripped from her hand.

Author's Notes: And thus does our two-parter come to an end. I hope you all enjoyed the past two chapters, and once again I apologize for the wait. Hopefully it will be no where near as long for chapter 6. Anyway, please leave me a review or PM me to let me know what you think and thank you for reading my story!


	6. The Regiment

Author's Notes: Sorry for the long wait on this one, attending a national convention can really put a dent in one's writing time. Anyway, here is Chapter 6 of Attack on Aincrad. Also, while I am here I would like you guys to help me out a bit of you don't mind too terribly. As far as responding to reviews from you guys, is it better to use the PM response feature to respond to reviews, or would you rather me respond to reviews in the Author's Notes of the following chapter? The downside of one being that it prohibits me from responding to guest reviews, and that of option 2 being that some might not the response to their review in the middle of the story page and clogging up the Author's Note's section. Since this is my first time writing for this site and I have seen many cases of either, please let me know which one you want in a poll I have just created on my Author Page. So after you have finished reading the chapter, please take your time to both tell me what you thought and how you would like me to respond to it! Wait, mandatory disclaimer time (groans)!: I am neither Reki Kawahara or Hajime Isayama and do not own either Sword Art Online or Attack on Titan. Thank you, and enjoy Chapter 6!

Year: 850 KS (Kyojin Sekai)

_It's happening again, _Armin thought with horror. _Just like 5 years ago, when they breached Wall Maria and I lost the last of my family. Just like Trost all those months ago where I watched my friends die_...Armin couldn't take his eyes off the sight. As he was taken out of the forest, he watched fading in the distance as Titan after Titan stepped through the now-gaping portal into Aincrad. _I thought...that I had found a place...where humanity could live free of the Titans. Must they take everything away from us, no matter what it is?_

As he was taken along, Armin thought back to the increasingly terrible chain of events that had taken place the minute they stepped back into their own world. First, like Mikasa had said, they were not alone in the forest. Dozens of Titans were slowly shambling through the forest toward the clearing. By the time Armin had come through, there was already a smoldering, steaming corpse of a 7-meter Titan lying on the ground near the portal. Beyond it had been a part of the trees that seemed isolated from the Titans, where Mikasa, who had gone through first, was waiting. _They're all coming from the south,_ Armin had realized, _from the breach in Wall Maria._ Jean maneuvered to a nearby branch, and Armin and Sasha had joined him. "Your handiwork? Nice kill." Jean had said, indicating the dead Titan to Mikasa.

"It was in the way. Now, we need to get back to the Scouting Regiment-"

"Let's wait. I want to see how this shield thing works."

Mikasa had looked around annoyed, but it was Sasha who had spoken up. "But look at all those Titans! Even Mikasa couldn't kill that many, we should get out of here!"

"We're up approximately 28 meters high up in this tree. We are well beyond the reach of even a 15-meter class." Armin had replied. He had wanted to make sure himself that their new friends, their new hope that humanity might have a haven from the Titans, was safe. "And Titans aren't built for climbing trees, or smart enough to try and break them down. We're safe here." And so they had turned to observe the portal, right as two 10-meter Titans had headed right for it. Armin had let out a sigh of relief as the two Titans appeared to bounce off of some sort of black and yellow barrier when they tried to go through the portal upright. _It lets something human-sized through, but no bigger. But what is that barrier made of?_ Armin had wondered. However, out of the corner of his eye Armin had seen an all-too-familiar explosion of light and sound, though a different sort than the one made by those strange crystals that Kirito and Asuna had used to get them all around. No, this was a different and altogether far grimmer prospect. Though the blast knocked him from his perch and Armin felt himself tumbling through the air to the forest floor below in the back of his mind, the one realization of what it was dominated his consciousness: the release of energy that heralded a human with Titan Shifting ability turning into their terrifying alternate form.

_ Eren?_ Armin had wondered. _No, Mikasa said he was still with the other Scouts_. _Then_...A terrible thought then crossed Armin's mind. _No, _he had thought, _please no, _not wanting to believe it, but knowing to be true, especially since he was one of those who had first guessed at this: that the Titan Shifter was none other than the human identity of one of the intelligent Titans, like the Armored Titan or the Colossal Titan.

Blinking, he had tried to stand up, but upon doing so realized that his maneuvering gear was damaged by the fall. Armin knew how to repair it, but he did not have the parts to do it there. _Or the time,_ he had thought as he heard massive footfalls behind him, drawing closer. Slowly, he had turned around, and saw a 5-meter Titan lazily wandering over to where he was. It looked at him with wide, greedy, hungry eyes. Armin tried to pick up his swords, but he knew they would be no use without his gear. _I need the others to save me,_ he thought. _Once again._ Right as he was about to cry for help from above, however, a massive shape burst through the trees at a very high speed. Armin had seen a Titan sprint only once before. He recognized the hulking mass of fused plate and flesh as none other than the Armored Titan, the destroyer of Wall Maria from 5 years ago. It smashed right into the 5-meter Titan, which happened to be straight in it's path, sending the smaller monster flying to the other side of the clearing. _It...saved me? _Armin had wondered, still in shock. However, the Armored Titan didn't stop there. Armin had looked at it's trajectory and realized it was headed...right for the portal.

"Armin!" He had heard Mikasa yell as she maneuvered down towards him. "Your gear...it's broken." Armin could do nothing but nod. "Jean!" Mikasa had called, "Get down here. You'll need to carry Armin."

"Mikasa..." Armin began. He didn't want this again, not after Trost.

"I'm not leaving you to die, I thought we already went over this."

"But you need every available fighter right now!" He had said, "And Jean can't fight while carrying me!"

"Armin, what are you talking about, we have to get out of here!"

"He's talking about the portal." Jean had said, having realized what exactly what was going on. "If that Titan is able to smash through that barrier like it did Wall Maria five years ago, 6,000 people are going to die." He saw Mikasa and Sasha's expressions turn to ones of shock. The dark-haired girl's expression grew pained as she made a decision. Mikasa had then turned and ran at Armin, throwing him over her shoulder. Knowing how strong she was, Armin could do nothing to resist. She fired her cables into trees away from the clearing and shot out a spurt of the gas. They were leaving. "Mikasa, no!" Jean had yelled, but had no choice to follow her. _Without Mikasa,_ thought Armin, _we don't stand a chance against that many. _

"I'm sorry Armin, Jean. Whatever you two saw on the other end of that shimmer or portal, it's more important that you report it back to the Scouts on one piece. I'm not letting you go on a suicide mission. And I don't think that barrier is a normal one, so if the officers think this is worth investigating we'll come back later with more Scouts and it will still be there." Mikasa had said as they retreated.

However, Armin, who Mikasa had held against her shoulder on his stomach, could still see the clearing. And the terrible fear that had been growing inside him since he saw the Armored Titan that his hope of Aincrad becoming a safe haven from the Titans for humanity would be dashed came true. The Armored Titan had smashed into the portal, and the barrier had flickered for only a second before shattering into a million shards of what looked like glass, like the corpses of the Titans when the SAO players were around and the member of Fuurinkazan that had been half-eaten. "It's too late." Armin had said. "I'm sorry, Asuna, Klein, Kirito." _Asuna killed it, yes, but that was just a lone 8-meter and she only knew where to kill it because I remembered to tell her. Against a group..._Armin had shuddered. _They're going to be no better than us. No,_ he then realized, _they're even worse off now. They have no Walls to hide behind, and they aren't prepared for this sort of thing at all..._

As they cleared the forest, Armin pulled out of his flashback. Mikasa stuck her landing as gracefully as possible while carrying another person. He slumped to the ground off of her. "They're all going to die." he said softly. "I thought we had finally found a place where people could live free of the Titans, but all this leads to..."

"Is more death and destruction at their hands." Jean said, looking similarity haggard. Mikasa offered Armin a hand, which he accepted and slowly stood up. Sasha offered the same to Jean, who rose as well. Armin heard a familiar animal sound, and turned to see... "Our horses!" Jean exclaimed. Indeed, a tall boy in a Scout uniform that Armin instantly recognized as Bertholt stood next to where they had landed with Jean's and Armin's horses, in addition to Mikasa's, Sasha's, and his own. _And Reiner's,_ Armin thought darkly. Almost seeming to read his mind, Bertholt asked: "Where's Reiner?"

"We had to leave him, but according to Armin he's in a safe place." Mikasa said. Bertholt looked as though he wanted to protest, but he knew as well as any member of the 104th that it was truly pointless to argue with Mikasa. "Come on. You two have a LOT of explaining to do when we get back." In silence they all mounted their horses and, Mikasa and Sasha taking the lead and with Bertholt bringing up the rear, rode back to the rest of the Expedition.

As they rode through the open country, Armin couldn't help but notice that their immediate route was completely deviod of Titans. However, whenever he did spot one or two off in the distance, they were all converging on a specific pont behind the group of Scouts. _They're headed for the clearing,_ Armin realized. _Something is directing them there, the same thing that drew all the Titans to Shiganshina so soon after the Wall was breached. Another Titan Shifter we haven't encountered yet?_ Armin wondered. It seemed the most likely theory, given the intelligent behavior of the Colossal and Armored Titans, and Eren's Titan form once he had finally gained full control of it. _But who would betray their own species like that, betray us to the Titans? The only humans who could get across the Wall easily without arousing suspicion was a member of the military. You swore to preserve human life and destroy the Titans, and yet you act to do the exact opposite. Why? _Armin wondered, disgusted that such false loyalty could exist yet all too aware that it did.

As they neared a massive forest that Armin recognized as an established forward base maintained and fortified by the Scouts as a safe haven and re-supply station for long Expeditions outside the Walls, Mikasa lifted her flare gun and fired, a green plume ascending into the sky from it's barrel. Several green flares soon flew up from within the forest in answer. "Good." She said, turning back to them, ""It's safe to enter." There was a break in the trees ahead that seemed to form a massive central path through the forest, into which they rode. Several sentries in the trademark green cloak of Scout Regiment stood vigil over the entrance to the thickly-wooded forest. _A good spot for a camp,_ thought Armin as they rode towards center of the forest. _Most of the forest is too thick for a group of Titans to get in easily, so we can bottleneck them if they attack._ Then, another, less welcome thought entered into his mind: _maybe the game was designed that way? No,_ thought Armin. _Aincrad is real, I was there, and I still don't understand a lot about it. It may be a virtual world or whatever they called it, but this world is not some mental construct. Only a demonic mind would dream up such hellish creatures. _

Finally, the Scouts rode up to a series of long rows of tents, campfires, and tables. There was even a few makeshift buildings and poles to tie up the horses at. A Scout who looked to be at least two graduating classes ahead of them directed them to a one of these poles, and they dismounted their horses. "How did you even find our horses?" Jean asked.

"They were drinking out of a nearby pond when we saw your flare yesterday." Sasha began, "By the time we got there, no one was there, and it was getting dark. The guy they put in charge of us cadets forbade any searches, but we snuck out at first light this morning." For describing a defiance of authority, Sasha still remained her energetic self.

"Where's Eren?" Armin asked.

"On the other side of the encampment, near the commander's tent. That's where Captain Levi's squad, which he's a part of, is at least." Mikasa said. _Of course she would know exactly where he's most likely to be,_ thought Armin. _Mikasa wouldn't let Eren out of her sight if she could, unless it was at the expense of lives of other people she cared about_.

"Armin! Jean! You're alive!" Armin turned to the sound of a familiar, girlish voice, to find Christa Lentz running towards them, that angelic smile that seemed a permanent resident on her face easing Armin's sadness a bit. Both he and Jean smiled sheepishly back for a second, before they saw the freckly dark-haired girl who was standing behind her.

"So I was wrong, Mikasa. It looks like a 5-meter Titan isn't picking it's teeth with those two." She gave Armin a mocking expression, though he knew from years that this was just part of Ymir's abusive personality.

"Hey, why a 5-meter!?" Jean asked, looking hurt at the suggestion that he couldn't kill such a small opponent by Titan standards of size.

"If it were any larger, it wouldn't even notice Armin!" Chimed in another voice, chuckling. Armin looked up and down himself. _Am I really THAT short? _

"I wouldn't be talking if I were you, Connie!" Jean said to the previous speaker. This brought a round of chuckling from everyone except Mikasa and Bertholt.

"Wait a minute, where's Reiner? Wasn't he with you guys?" Connie asked.

"We had...to leave him behind." Jean said slowly. Armin noticed Bertholt clench his fists in anger. "Otherwise, we..."

"...all would have died. And if what you said earlier is true, Jean, he's fine." Mikasa said, as Jean was obviously still frustrated at them having to abandon their comrade. _If we hadn't, we wouldn't have made it here alive to tell them about Aimcrad. If they'll believe, us there may be some hope still left for those people in there...for my hope... _

After learning of the absence of one of their own, the mood of the other members of the 104th quieted. "The officers were furious when you guys left this morning." Ymir said.

"Actually, I just got back from the command section of the camp. Commander Erwin wanted to see you in his quarters as soon as you arrived." Connie said. _The commander?_ Armin wondered. He both dreaded it and thought it too good to be true. The leader of the Scout Regiment, and one of the most influential men in the entire military. _If I can convince him that Aincrad is real and to send the Expedition through the portal to make sure the Titans don't get a foothold... _"C'mon, Armin, I'm sure he just wants a report. It's Mikasa they'll grill for disobeying orders." Connie said as he punched him on the shoulder, minsintepreting the nervous yet determined look on the other boy's face.

"Let's go." Mikasa said, and she, Jean, and Armin all began the walk through the camp to the commander.

"Glad to see you made it back in one piece, cadets! Did you see any Titans on your way?" Said the an overeager voice as Armin and the others walked into the command room, one of the few semi-permeanant structures erected from previous stops here by Expeditions. Armin had been expecting just the commander or maybe even just one of his underlings in the command staff, but instead gasped as he walked into the room. Assembled in chairs that looked to provide various levels of discomfort, around a center table with a map of this region of the land between Wall Maria and Wall Rose, were some of the most skilled officers and Titan slayers in the entire Scout Regiment. Seated at the head of the table was Commander Erwin, leader of the entire Scout Reigment. He was flanked on one side by Mike Zacharius, the man with the supernatural sense of smell and second only to Captain Levi himself in his ability to kill Titans, and on the other by Hanje Zoe, the one who had greeted them as they entered and infamous for her obsession with studying Titans. On the other end of the table was Captain Levi, the legendary black-haired soldier who was in command of the elite Special Operations squad and who had slain countless dozens of Titans singlehandedly. Flanking him was the deadly team of soldiers that made up his command, though Armin noticed that Eren was absent from among them.

"Take your seats, soldiers." Erwin said after Jean, the last to enter, came through the cramped door. The trio sat down in the middle of the table. _Why are they all here? _Armin wondered nervously. _Do they already know about Aincrad? What's going on? _"Private Ackerman." Levi said, directing his narrow-eyed gaze at the newcomers, "Why did you directly disobey the orders given to you to not leave this forest unless commanded to do so, let alone take Braus and Hoover with you?"

Mikasa rose from her seat and began:"After a couple of the communications squads which these two were members of disappeared from the formation yesterday without sending up a black flare signaling they had been attacked," she said, indicating Jean and Armin, "my squad saw a single green flare far behind the rest of the formation, near their last known position. It was the same place as where the Titans seemed to begin converging on. I figured that whatever was drawing them there must have been something of interest to the Scouts, and may be some sort of new Titan variant. I was planning to go myself to investigate but Privates Sasha Braus and Bertholt Hoover insisted upon joining me."

"And you also set out to rescue your friends." Levi countered. Armin and Jean looked at their feet. It was their fault Mikasa was getting chewed out, after all.

"Would you rather have us leave three soldiers to die?!"

"No, but you were incredibly lucky that we didn't lose three more!" Mike said. Levi nodded. Throughout all this, Levi remained calm, composed. Armin had always seen him like that, earlier when he had saved him, Eren and Mikasa at Trost, and now as well. Even when he had beat Eren during the boy's trial to prove a point, he had had an air of collectedness about him.

"I notice that there are only two of them with you, Ackerman. Where is Private Braun?"

"We...were not able to recover him. While I do not know whether he is dead or alive as he was not with these two when we found them, we were forced to abandon our search or have our route of escape cut off."

"If you're going to defy orders anyway and go on a rescue mission at least bring everyone back."

While Armin understood very well that the chain of command had to be respected in the Scout Regiment in order for it to function and a defiance of it had better have stellar results in order for it to be justified, given the relieved looks Armin had begun to notice on their comrades' faces when they had returned from Aincrad it seemed everyone had begun to give them up for dead. Mikasa had gotten them out of that clearing alive, and the officers were taking her apart when they should be figuring out what they could do about the fact that the Titans had just been unleashed on Aincrad and it's 6,000 unprepared inhabitants. "It's not her fault, Reiner wandered off while Jean and I were still asleep. If she had not gotten to us when she did and made that decision, none of us would be here." he said, jumping to his feet

Immediately, he realized he had spoken out of turn, and hung his head, sitting back down, but Commander Erwin simply said: "While she will be reprimanded later, Levi, Mikasa Ackerman has just retrieved two of her comrades alive and well from Titan-infested territory with zero casualties, a feat few soldiers, especially ones fresh out of the Cadet Corps, could accomplish." Levi responded with only a small nod. The tension in the room seemingly evaporating, Erwin turned to them. "So instead, I want your full report. Where did you find them?"

_Mikasa has no idea what that place actually is,_ Armin realized as she began to respond. "I spotted a flare sent up from a position well behind the formation's rear yesterday soon before we arrived at this camp. Upon investigating it along with my fellow cadets Sasha Braus and Bertholt Hoover, I discovered that it's place of origin was a very large forest containing approximately 100 Titans in the general vicinity."

"So that's where they all went..." Erwin said slowly.

"But why congregate in an empty forest?" Mike wondered aloud. Then it hit Armin. Why they had seen so few Titans once they had cleared the forest, why the Scout Regiment had instead of pressing on entrenched themselves in this forest. _They have no idea what's going on, why the Titans are all converging on that portal..._

"When I arrived at the center of the forest," Mikasa said, continuing her report, "I noticed something never seen before. In the air was a sort of vibrant shimmer, and any Titan that attempted to cross it was deflected by a flash of some sort. Sasha went to investigate it up close, after which I followed her, killing one of the two Titans. The other Titan pursed her under and through the shimmer by jumping to the ground, which had a clearance point of approximately 3 meters. They disappeared from view, and did not seem to reappear on the other side of it."

Several eyes widened in the room. "A gate of some kind?" Hanje wondered aloud. "But to where?"

Commander Erwin on the other hand seemed to pick up on something else that Mikasa said. "You say this gate or portal HAD a barrier preventing anything over three meters from entering?"

"Yes."

"I assume you attempted to follow Braus through it?" He asked, gazing at her as if he already knew part of the answer.

"I did, it seemed the most likely location for Armin and Jean. When I entered I found a similar clearing but devoid of any sign of both humans and Titans except for the footprints from the Titan that had just entered. At their end I found these two along with Sasha and two humans, a boy and a girl similar in age to myself, wearing clothes unlike anything I've seen before. If it weren't for the fact that they both wielded strange swords I would swear they were civilians, as they did not bear any military markings."

"And the Titan?" Hanje asked expectantly.

"I saw no sign of it when I arrived, so I would assume one of those present killed it. If we remained there any longer the Titans on the other side of the gate would have filled the clearing making it impossible for us to retreat, a situation which I made Jean and Armin aware of. We fled back to here, but not before witnessing the Armored Titan appear and apparently destroy the barrier protecting the gate." Mikasa finished somberly. She sat back down.

The air in the room had grown even more tense. "The Armored Titan, which we haven't seen in 5 years." Mike said, "The one that didn't show at Trost, where we all feared it would do the same to Wall Rose that it did to Wall Maria in Shiganshina. Could this have been more important to them than Trost? Why?"

Armin felt as though a chill passed through him momentarily as he realized what they were about to ask. Levi spoke: "I believe that question is probably left to the two who impulsively went through that thing in the first place." Armin could feel the unsurety bubbling inside as he realized that the fearsome Captain of the Special Operations Squad was staring right at him. _You can do this,_ he thought to himself. _No, you HAVE to do this. It's the only way you can help humanity on both sides of the portal now._ After a moment, he rose to his feet.

"That portal, that's what we ended up calling it anyway," he started, trying and somewhat failing to squish the nervousness out of his voice, "it leads to another world. A world, which until today had never seen or heard of Titans." Almost every person in the room besides himself and Jean couldn't seem to contain their shock. Even Captain Levi looked less disinterested than usual.

"Another world? An entire world without Titans?" Hanje asked in disbelief. Armin nodded slowly.

"Those two other people Private Ackerman mentioned, I take it they were natives to this...new world, seeing as civilians are not allowed beyond the Walls?" Levi inquired. _And for good reason, _thought Armin. He had long since stopped trying to imagine all the horrible ways his parents could have died when they fatally disobeyed that policy all those years ago, leaving him with his grandfather until that man too would die in Operation Reclaim Wall Maria. _And now it's happening again, to all those people in Aincrad._ If he was going to make his case for the Scouts to aid them, now was the time.

However, it was Jean who next spoke. "Their names were Kirito and Asuna, and from what we saw and heard, on the other side of that portal is an entire inhabited world free of Titans. Or it was, until the Armored Titan smashed the barrier. For all we know they are both dead by now." Armin grimaced as Jean said the last bit. He also noticed that neither he nor Jean were mentioning the GAME factor, not that Armin wanted to believe it anyway. That on top of everything else would have been too much to take. If it weren't for Mikasa vouching for what little she had seen, Armin somewhat doubted that Commander Erwin, who was still looking at them with rapt attention along with the other senior officers, would believe them in the first place.

"Inhabited? Just how many humans live there?" Levi asked, and Armin could feel as if there was emotion under the short captain's usual monotone, buried though it was.

"We never saw any major settlements, though a couple were passingly mentioned by them." Armin said. "However, both of them said that there were approximately only 6,000 humans there, due to some sort of disaster." The officers' faces grew even more startled by this. _Now is where I make my move, for all of humanity's sake,_ thought Armin. "Though they seemed trained to fight, they had no idea how to kill a Titan when we ran into the one pursuing Sasha." He said somberly, "they have no defensive walls, and aside from the dozen or so people we encountered have no idea that Titans even exist. And now due to the actions of a known hostile Titan Shifter, the Armored Titan, they are under attack from hundreds of Titans." The nervousness that had begun inside him bubbling out as his voice got louder, Armin continued, "They will die and their free world will be lost to humanity, both theirs and ours! So as a soldier sworn to preserve the human race, I ask that the course of this Expedition be repurposed to save them and their world so that we might find a way to escape this hell!" He realized almost as an embarrassed afterthought that he had nearly yelled at his commanding officers, and cracked a salute and small bow of the head.

To say that the senior officers were startled by this was an understatement. "6,000 unprepared humans..." Levi trailed off grimly.

"An entire land without a Titan to be seen, how could we not have known?" Mike said, blinking.

Levi's squad, which up until this point had remained respectfully silent (though Armin had noticed one man with flamboyant grey-black hair give him a dirty look after he had raised his voice), erupted into chaos talking amongst themselves and with the other officers about this rather transformative new development in humanity's sitaution. Only Commander Erwin himself remained silent, as if deep in thought about something. He seemed to finally decide upon whatever it was he had been dissecting with his mind, and calmly spoke: "Thank you, Private Arlert. You may sit." Armin did so. The rest of the room quieted down as the commander rose. "Though I will discuss it later with you all," he said, though Armin knew he meant only the senior officers present. "I will say that I have come to a decision. Using this new information provided to us by the most capable batch of Cadets I have seen in years, the Scout Regiment will repurpose this Expedition into an act which I believe will ultimately save our race. As for now, your are dismissed, Privates."

"Yes, sir!"All three members of the 104th rose and saluted. Armin felt a sense of relief wash over him, as did every other person in the room it seemed. _The Scouts are going to help,_ he thought. _Aincrad and it's people, and my hope for a safe haven for humanity, are not lost. _However, as he got up from his chair he saw something in Erwin's eyes that sent a bucket of water over the fire of hope that had just been lit. Though Armin could not know what Commander Erwin was planning, the look in the man's eyes was the same as the one General Dot Pixis had when, roughly following Armin's plan, he had sent hundreds of soldiers to their deaths to distract the Titans in Trost long enough for Eren to seal the breach in the outer Wall. Armin had sometimes imagined that anyone looking at him might have seen the same look. The chilling look that came when you were about to do something that you thought through your core was for the good, but would come at such a terrible cost so as to seem empty unless you looked past it, and in doing so, lost a part of your humanity. As he left the cramped building behind Jean and Mikasa, who still looked as though the terrible events that had occured today just might have a light at the end of their tunnel, Armin thought back to what he had seen in Erwin Smith's eyes. _No,_ Armin thought, _it wasn't the same look._ Somehow, what he had seen chilled him even more.

Author's Notes: Once again, thank you for reading and please be sure to both leave a review and participate in the above-mentioned poll. Also, on the topic of reviews, despite publishing twice my usual output I only received 4 reviews since my previous update before this, my lowest record yet. I'm not trying to complain, but reviews of all size, shape, and type are both a writer's engine grease, as they help us refine our work, and our fuel, as they keep us moving forward. So please feel free to tell me what you think of my work in a review. I swear the wait for Chapter 7 will be shorter than this. I hope you enjoyed it, and enjoy the new episodes of SAO every Saturday!


	7. Aincrad In Flames

Author's Notes: I am so sorry this chapter took so long to write, school happened and if there is anything that can stall one's writing it is the meddling of school. Either way, longest chapter I've written so far so you guys get a little more than last time if that helps. I really enjoy writing this and despite all that is going on with my life eight now I will try to keep writing this as fast as I can. I would like to take a moment to thank all of you guys for the significantly larger number of reviews from last chapter! Your feedback is what keeps me running and (hopefully) improving. Mandatory Disclaimer Time (ugh): I am neither Reki Kawaharah or Hajime Isayama, and therefore do not own either Sword Art Online or Attack on Titan. Now, sit back, relax, and enjoy chapter 7!

Year:2 SAOHI (Sodo Ato Onrain Hatsubai Irai)

The bright light of a teleport faded, and despite the fact that he along with most of the other SAO players had become used to it after two years of being trapped in the game, he blinked as the glow disappeared. _Why,_ thought Klein, as he and his guildmates stepped off the Floor 48 teleport gate. _Why would I blink like that? Oh yeah,_ he thought as he turned his head towards the smoke in the distance, that, if they were in the real world, Klien figured would sting his eyes even from here. _It's the reason we're here. The Titans._

Ten minutes later, in what passed for a central square in the small city of Lindas, the main settlement on the 48th Floor, a crowd of nervous players were gathered in front of the teleport gate. Even though Klien silently thanked Asuna, who had been put in charge of this operation, for putting Fuurinkazan in the rear guard in the city center, he could still feel the fear wafting off of the crowd. _It's not as bad as what's waiting for those on the outer wall,_ Klein thought. As if to reinforce his point, as he saw a full party of Dragon Alliance members clank past in their heavy battle armor heading for the forward guard, one was shaking uncontrollably with fear. Klien didn't blame him. _After all,_ Klien thought to himself, _I felt what you're going through a week ago. _

_A week. Has it really been only that long,_ Klein wondered? _Just a week since that day in the forest, where we first saw these damn things? If we hadn't gone clearing on the 75th Floor that day, if we hadn't mistaken that portal for a god-damn safe zone, would Dale and Issin have died?_ Sometimes Klien wondered if this was all his fault. After all, they were the ones who had first stumbled through that stupid thing and gotten the attention of the Titans. _No, bad Klien, there's no use thinking about that right now,_ he thought. Finally, out of the corner of his eye Klien saw the teleport gate activate externally for what would likely be the last time, if the Titan's behavioral patterns held true, and the last of the evacuation team appeared on it's platform. Quickly, that group headed to the central tower just off the square where the operation was being directed for orders.

"Boss, shouldn't we begin getting these people out of here?" Kunimittz said, casting a nervous glance around the city.

"I think we're supposed to wait for a signal or something from Asuna." Klien said. _But if we don't start now, we'll have another Algade, _he thought, thinking back to the botched attempt to get everyone out of Aincrad's largest city with the Titans approaching. It was only two days ago, and fresh in Klien's mind. By the time everyone had gathered for the evacuation, the Titans had already gotten to the gates. Klien remembered hearing from the debriefing on Floor 49 that 15 members of the Divine Dragon Alliance had given their lives to defend the entrance to the city as long as possible, but were ultimately devoured within minutes. And after the Titans breached a central city's gates was when evacuation became damn near impossible.

On the day Kirito and Asuna narrowly escaped the initial breach of the portal that resulted in this nightmare, Klien had been arguing with his guild mates about what to do for breakfast. No one felt good enough to go out, and the horror and loss from the previous day had left everyone irritable as hell. But their argument had been interrupted when suddenly the entire room and everything in it, including their avatars, had been embraced in black with yellow 1s and 0s covering anything. _What the hell is this,_ Klien had wondered, _binary code?_ Why the code of Sword Art Online had physically manifested itself like that no one knew, though Klien and many others had a little theory: that the code itself had been rewritten. Because on that day, THINGS had started to change.

Though everyone was freaked out by it, the code's appearance had somewhat unified the guild a bit and they had all headed off to breakfast. Klien would never forget how innocent the event was that they realized the rules of SAO had changed. When they were getting something off a plate, Dynamm had accidentally stabbed Harry with his fork. Instead of nothing happening to Harry's health seeing as they were in a town and therefore a safe zone, he had yelled and his hand had started bleeding. _Just like Issin and Dale when the Titans killed them. Just like in the real world._ As Klien had realized this, at that table in the NPC-run restaurant, the implications had made him shudder and wonder just what exactly this meant. When they heard what happened on the 75th floor, of course, what had occured became all too clear. Hundreds of giant humanoid monsters had converged ON THE TOWN, killing any players they came across. The survivors who had escaped to the supposed safety of the town had been terrified, babbling about blood and regenerating creatures whose health bars never seemed to deplete. They had mostly fled through the teleport gate or via crystals to the lower floors, but the players still inside Collina, the 75th Floor's main settlement simply waited to see what was so frightening, believing themselves protected by the safe zone system. That belief that SAO was still the same had cost the players on Floor 75 200 lives, as teleport crystals and the gate had refused to work after the Titans had crossed the old safe zone limits, another change in the system.

Klien had remembered how scared everyone was when wind of the fall of Floor 75 was announced in the latest issue from the news guild. For the first time in two years, the players were being forced back, losing Floors that through hard work and sacrifice had been wrested from the monsters, and, by extension, Kayaba's system itself. But at least they would stop there, on Floor 75. Monsters didn't leave the Floor they were on after all. That wasn't how SAO worked. Or, at least, that's how it used to be. Klien and the rest of Fuurinkazan had actually been there on Floor 74 when they saw them off in the distance, emerging from the labyrinth like some giant nudist pride parade. The survivors of Fuurinkazan had immediately used crystals to teleport back home. _We should have warned them,_ Klien thought in hindsight. The 74th Floor too was massacred, another 100 players caught off guard so by the time the teleport system went down on that floor it was too late for those who had not already fled.

By then the players knew that the minutes the Titans were sighted the Floor had to be abandoned. Still, some tried to defend their homes, especially if the settlement was the base of one of the major guilds. Still, players died in droves. Within 3 days, 13 floors of Aincrad had been taken away from them. In the chaos, the disparate clearers of SAO, the strongest players, looked for someone to lead them against this dire new threat to their goal of freedom. Klien was as surprised as any when Asuna and Kirito told him that after they had informed Heathcliff of the appearance of the Titans in Aincrad, rather than take charge and lead the defense of the front line, the commander of the strongest clearing guild had disappeared.

The Divine Dragon Alliance, always a bit irked that they were ranked just below the Knights of the Blood Oath despite having more than twice as many players in their clearer guild, took their chance to try and seize the spotlight in the eyes of the players. Lind, the leader of the DDA, led an organized team of clearers to defend Selmburg, the capital of the 61st Floor. It had been a success, as the the island nature of the 61st Floor had let only a few Titans through at a time, and, armed with the knoweledge of the Titan's almost-impossible-to-reach weak spot that Asuna had gained from Armin and his companions, 30 of the creatures had been killed before their tide seemed to end and no more attempted to breach the wall of clearers. A hard-won success though: 16 clearers, some of the top players in all of Sword Art Online, had been devoured by the monsters in the process. Still, Lind would come back a hero. For the first time, the Titans had been stalled. The citizens of Selmburg were preparing to return to their homes. _That's what everyone thought at least,_ Klien recalled, as most of the clearers had left to go back to their respective homes that were left. Only a 20-man guild, new to the front lines, the Blessed Blades, had remained. They had killed almost half the Titans in the battle, and the few civilian players that had remained in the city had thrown a party in their honor. But during the festivities, something had shown up that wiped out almost every single player there. Only a tank from the Blessed Blades had escaped to the top of labyrinth of the floor below, the only way to leave a floor once the Titans breached it's main settlement under the new system. He could barely speak, muttering about some sort of "giant girl Titan" that had tore through the entire guild in a matter of seconds, moving far faster and with much greater skill than what seemed to be the norm for the Titans.

Since then, the Titans had been relentless in their advance, taking floor after floor with another hundred players caught off-guard and dead in both this world and the real one. In five days the Titans had driven the players back all the way to Algade on the 50th Floor. _25 Floors...almost all the progress we made in the last year._ It was there that the Knights of the Blood Oath, in disarray after the disappreance of Heathcliff, had finally made their move, led by no less than a certain couple who had previously been enjoying their honeymoon on the 22nd floor before this hell came about. It made sense that Asuna had taken over the Knights, seeing as she had been second-in-command beforehand. As little humor had done to lighten the situation that day in Algade, Klien had still chuckled a little to see Kirito standing at the center of attention, obviously uncomfortable in his white Knight's uniform instead of one of his iconic flowing black coats.

Asuna and the Knights of the Blood Oath had tried to stage a coordinated evacuation of the city, so that the players could all get put before the Titans breached the city. As much as Klein didn't want to say the words he knew they had echoed in Kirito and Asuna's minds for the last two days: it had been a massacre. From the incoherent rumblings of the surviving Blessed Blades member and the very-easily-felt strain after all the deaths when the game had just begun to be safe for most players barring an act of utter stupidity like going into a dungeon you weren't high enough level for, though, some clearers were too battered to make another stand, and so only half the ones called to help had shown up. With less than 100 people successfully evacuated through the gate out of Algade's player population of roughly 600, the Titans had breached the city walls and proceeded to devour NPCs and players left and right. Some of the clearers assigned to guard the large number of civilian players had panicked and ran or teleported out at the last second.

All that Klein remembered after that was a blur of rage and fear. He recalled saving a group of three players who had been cornered by a 15-meter Titan, cutting the girl in the group free of it's hand while Harry and Kunumittz sliced at it's ankles, bringing the monster down. The anger that had overcome him as he had driven his katana into the weak spot had been almost unnatural, something that despite being sealed in a game of life or death for two years, Klein had rarely felt before. After that he had lost track of that group of three in the mass of players fleeing the city. Asuna had managed to somehow organize a skirmish line defense of the rear of the main body of the retreat, and so over 100 members of Algade's player population, along with about 60 percent of the clearer defense force, safely got to the 49th Floor labyrinth. If she hadn't, their casualties likely would have been double that. The group Fuurinkazan had saved from the Titan wasn't among the survivors.

An indignant female voice brought Klein out of his flashback. He looked from the ground he had evidently been staring at to find Harry talking to a young pink-haired girl in a sort of maid's dress. "I'm asking you, where is he? I can see the guild symbol by your HP bar, I know you guys in Fuurinkazan know him." She said.

Harry, who had apparently not been able to give a satisfactory answer to an earlier question, was flustered by the girl's temper. "I'm sorry, only the boss knows him really well..." Harry searched the corner of the plaza that Fuurinkazan was guarding until he found Klein. "Hey, Klein, this girl here wants to talk to you!"

Sighing, Klien strolled over. The girl looked 15 or 16, though even with SAO's almost seemless recreation of their real bodies exact age was hard to tell and no one was impolite enough to ask anyone they didn't know well. She was cute in a tsundere way, but given the overall situation he decided to stow that thought in the recesses of his mind for now.

"You're the leader of Fuurinkazan?" She asked, as if she was unimpressed.

Klein tried his best to put on an offended look, but failed. He settled for a mockingly overdramatic bow. "Yes. Klein at your service."

"Where's Kirito?" She asked bluntly. "I know you know him, and if Asuna's here he's bound to be here as well."

"You know them?" he asked. She nodded. _Now that I think about it, I recall Kirito mentioning getting his second sword made by a certain pink-haired female player, _Klein thought. "You wouldn't happen to be Lisbeth the master blacksmith would you?"

"Yeah, that's me. Kirito said something about me, did he?" She asked.

"He may have." Klein said, feeling a mischievous smile creep across his face for a second before vanishing. "He's out by the east gate, leading the defense. But you're a civilian, and the evacuation is about to-"he didn't get to finish as Lisbeth took off for the specified location of the Black Swordsman.

"I can take care of myself! Thanks anyway!" She called as she ran.

Klein saw her lips move to say more, but whatever it was was drowned out by an inevitable sound that Klein had been dreading: the mournful clang from the town belltowers that meant that Titans had been spotted heading for Lindas. _Damnit, I don't care what level she is, she's going to get killed if she ends up fighting a Titan by herself!_ Harry noticed the conflicted look on his face and called: "You go after her and bring her back alive, boss. We'll hold the fort down here!" Klein did a quick salute, and ran after Lisbeth.

_ I know that just because the game replicates our real bodies does not neccasarily mean it replicates their physical capabilities in the real world as well, but this girl sure as hell can run,_ thought Klein as he followed Lisbeth through the streets. Klein could tell from how the town walls loomed closer that they were nearing the eastern gate. From the way the ground was slightly rumbling under his feet in a rather unnerving manner, the red-haired player could also tell that they were nearing the Titans. The bells rang continously now, like an alarm clock you just couldn't hit the snooze button on no matter how much you wanted to, so it was pointless to try and yell for her to stop.

They rounded a corner, and the wooden gates of Lindas were right in front of them. Lisbeth ran through, and Klein followed right behind. As soon as Lisbeth had crossed to the other side though, she froze in horror. Klein soon saw why. The battlefield, if it could be called that, was a mess, with long streaks of blood here and there. The Titans had attacked in one large group at the east gate, and so it was almost one monster to each defender. The players were losing that fight.

Klien saw a tank charge a 10-meter Titan head-on, slicing it's left hand off only to be grabbed by the right. Klein's hand twitched at his katana in it's sheathe, but even then it was already too late, as the Titan brought the struggling player into it's mouth feet first and bit off his legs. The player's HP dropped by 30%, but when the Titan threw the player into it's mouth and chomped down. The line that indicated a player's very life flew past the red and vanished. The player screamed pitifully as a spray of blood came out of the Titan's mouth, only for him to mercifully shatter into polygons moments later.

Another group of three players attempted to hold off a Titan that was nearing dangerously close to the gate. They all were lightly armored, wielding daggers or one-handed swords, darting in to try to get a sword skill in on the Titan in between it's blows. "Stay here." Klein said to Lisbeth. He drew his blade, like he had so many times the past two years, the motion feeling effortless and natural. Pointing his foot at the melee ahead, Klein took off, Karukenai out in front of him.

_ I shouldn't have bothered,_ Klein thought as he approached the group: the Titan was doomed. It had bent down to try and grab one of the players who had been hanging back a little, while his evidently damaged HP recovered, but doing so exposed the back of it's neck to reach from the ground with a good enough leap, and blur of white, red, blue, and black told Klein a certain someone had taken the opportunity. A spray of blood came out from the Titan where it was sliced into, and the deformed giant collapsed, only to shatter into polygons seconds later.

A player in a white coat far too flashy for their own taste closed the resulting kill notification window with a swipe of his finger. The slayer of the Titan sighed exhuastedly, the hands that held his two swords sagging. _Even clearing a dungeon isn't as tiring as fighting these damn things,_ Klein remarked to himself. The player in the white coat looked up to see the leader of Fuurinkazan approaching, and Kirito's serious expression lightened a bit as he recognized his friend.

"Klein!? What are you doing here, Asuna said she specifically put you-" Kirito stopped himself as he realized what he was saying.

"In the back so I wouldn't have to face the Titans again? We've all been through that by now, I don't need special treatment." Klein said, though he could tell Kirito knew he was glad for his guild's sake that they were in the back. "I would offer my assistance, but it seems things aren't ALL bad here." Indeed, as if inspired by Kirito's disposal of the earlier Titan, the other defending clearers were becoming more ferocious and effective in combat, and three more Titans fell. Now only 5 were left of the Titans immediately at the east gate, though they were close together so any attempt to charge in on one would get you grabbed by another. However, so too were the players postured so that any attempt to procure a snack by the Titans would be just as ineffective.

So what brings you to the front line?" Kirito asked, sheathing his swords now that the situation had for a moment emerged from total chaos.

"A certain Lindas inhabitant was very insistent on seeing you before she evacuated. She wouldn't listen even though the warning bell went off as she was leaving so I went after her." Klein jerked his thumb over his shoulder to indicate Lisbeth. Kirito looked over his shoulder and saw the pink-haired girl, who was bravely trying to not panic at the sights of the carnage that had just occurred. She noticed who Klein was talking to and ran over to the two. She raised her arms as if to hug him, but seemed to cancel the gesture halfway. "Left quite an impression last time you were in Lindas, did you?" Klein said, attempting to make light of the tense situation. He was rewarded when both Kirito and Lisbeth turned matching shades of red. "Uh-oh, should I be warning Asuna about something?"

Kirito's expression went from embarrassed to angry in a second. "Don't even joke about that, Klein! I would never betray Asuna like that!"

"Hey, man, I'm just joking." Klein said. Lisbeth looked upset, and Klein was desperate to keep his friend from saying anything stupid that might make it worse.

The black-haired swordsman took the hint, and turned to Lisbeth. "Now what are you doing out here?! The evacuation must have started minutes ago!"

She proceeded to pout in what Klein would under calmer circumstances consider a very cute manner and said: "You almost always visit the shop at least two times a month, but I haven't heard a thing from either your or Asuna for almost three weeks, and when in all this hell of whatever is going on with SAO now I find out you two will be in Lindas LEADING the evacuation-"

She continued to speak, but something else caught Klein's attention. It was a message from Asuna, who was organizing the actual evacuation back in the town square. Klein tapped the icon and read the message. He saw Kirito and Lisbeth were still immersed in their little argument, though it had gotten a lot more calm and friendly than the awkward beginning, so Klein cleared his throat. The pair turned to him. Klein read the message aloud: "Speaking of the evacuation, it's finished. All 187 of the player residents of this floor that made it to the city, save Lisbeth here, are now safely evacuated to Floor 35."

Klein looked around to see the other defenders receive the same message, and a collective sigh of relief could be heard amongst them. The five Titans that had been left earlier were nowhere to be seen, probably shattered into a million tiny little graphical particles by now. "Alright!" Kirito shouted, raising his hand for attention. "The low-level players are out safely, it's time for us to get out as well!" A ragged cheer rang out among the defenders, though it was laced with the grim fact that they had taken casualties. The sound effect of menus opening and being scrolled through rang out across the grassy field in front of the gate, as the players equipped their teleport crystals. Some raised their crystals and called out the names of various cities on the floors that had yet to fall, and disappeared in flashes of light and sound. _Phew, _thought Klein as he equipped his own crystal. _They haven't breached the wall yet._ However, the bells, which had fallen silent minutes ago, suddenly rang out with new urgency. He lowered the crystal he had been raising and turned to Kirito. The black-haired boy's eyes widened and a grimace crept over his face. They both knew what the bells meant now. _The Titans have gotten in._

Thunderous footsteps seemed to shake the ground, and Klein turned with a mournful look to see approximately ten Titans approaching the gate. _10 Titans, against what?_ He looked around. Aside from Kirito, Lisbeth, and himself, there were only 10 defenders left at their section of the wall, all heavily demoralized now that the easy escape route via teleportation was no longer available to them.

"Retreat to the Labyrinth! Rendezvous with the other defenders there!" Kirito shouted, unsheathing one of his swords. The players didn't need to be told twice, and ran into the city. Being at the east gate, they had the farthest to go until they reached the safety of the realm of Floor 47. Kirito had grabbed Lisbeth with one hand, dragging her along whilst holding his black Elucidator longsword out with the other. Klein ran as hard as he had when chasing Lisbeth to the gate to keep up with them. He saw a messy brown-haired Titan approach one of the town's bell towers a few streets over, and snake a hand in. As the hand subsequently emerged holding a struggling player, the Titan turned to face them, and Klein saw that the creature's face was twisted into some sort of horrifically wide and clownish grin permenantly. As the monster bit down on it's victim's head, killing that player forever in both this world and the real one in different yet equally gruesome ways, the bells fell silent with no one left alive to ring them.

A scream to his right alerted Klein to the fact that they had walked into a trap, in a street intersection just a block away from the wooden gate that heralded the entrance to Lindas closest to their escape route. Four titans had them cornered, and each had snatched a player. Lisbeth, Klein, and Kirito looked on in horror as the unfortunate four were quickly devoured. There were more Titans coming into the city now, at least twenty must have been inside the walls at this point. _If only we could burst past them,_ thought Klein, but there were three Titans standing directly between the players and their intended destination. However, those Titams suddenly fell over, their ankles somehow slashed. _Where did that come from? No one of us attacked them..._however it became clear when three different groups of players charged in, each one having one player jump onto the back one of one of the toppled giants, stabbing the weak spot with a high-power sword skill. Klein recognized Asuna pull her rapier from the Titan on the right, while a brown-haired greatsword user in DDA command armor that Klein was pretty sure had to be Lind finished off the one on the left. It was Harry who vaulted onto the middle Titan, and proceeded to mercilessly attack it with his sword until it shattered. "Boss!" Harry called out as he saw Klein, and despite the fact that the number of Titans surrounding them had now increased to seven, he was awash with relief to see Fuurinkazan hadn't suffered any casualties as he rejoined his guild. He didn't intend to lose any more of his friends to those things.

"Kirito!" Asuna cried out, unable to keep her own relief out of her voice, "Everyone else has made it to the Labyrinth, we need to get out of here!" Kirito nodded. "Squad F, hold the Titans off for a minute and then retreat with the rest. Use your Throwing Sword Skills to blind them at range if you can!" The current commander of the KOB ordered, and a player party of Knights members took up a defensive position in front of the gate while the other players bolted for the gate.

_We're going to make it,_ thought Klein with an almost euphoric sense of relief. The labyrinth entrance was in sight. Then the screams from behind them turned Klein's blood cold. _The rear defense party..._while other players surged ahead to safety, Klein and the rest of Fuurinkazan turned around. Already, he could see Asuna, Lisbeth, and Kirito turning as well. Instead of the sight of Titans devouring the poor party, however, Klein merely saw them laying sprawled in the distance, and ahead of them, running unnaturally fast for the giant monsters, were 3 Titans.

_Abnormals, _Klein realized. Ever since the day where the SAO code had weirdly fluctuated over everything, the Titan's hp bars had become visible to the players. While this mattered little as their HP never changed unless you struck them in the weak spot in which case it zeroed instantly usually, it had allowed the players at large to determine what to call the creatures and that the weak spot did anything without the few who knew about it having to explain the story of the people from the other side of the portal that had lived with the fear of Titans all their lives. _Armin, Jean, Reiner, where are you when we need you? _

The three Titans were charging right for them, paying no heed to the downed players behind them. Klein once again drew Karukenai, training the blade on the oncoming monsters. But then the three abnormal did something no SAO player had ever seen a Titan do: they jumped up into the air. Two of the Titans landed, one on the left and right, of Kirito, Asuna, and Lisbeth, while the third practically belly-flopped right in the middle of Fuurinkazan. The resulting shockwaves sent players flying in all directions.

Klein recovered quickly enough, and he reached down to help Kunumittz up, who had fallen next to him. The other members of Fuurinkazan all gor back on their feet. The Titan, whose facial expression was that of a stupid grin that Klein wanted to slice off with his sword, pushed itself up onto two feet, but before it could attack any of his friends again Klein raised his katana above his head and charged. He felt his features contort into a fierce, determined expression. He slashed at the first hand to come at him, slicing the appendage in half, before diving under the legs of the Titan and angling his sword into a massive side slash that took out the Titan's right ankle. However, a shadow fell over Klein, and he looked up to see the Titan's foot about to come down on him. _Is this the way I'm really going to go?_ wondered Klein. _Crushed to death under this Titan's foot, and then...what, wait for the Nervegear to fry my little brain like beans in a microwave?_ However, a familiar short sword jabbed the leg enough out of position that the stomp missed Klein. "We've crippled it for about a minute or so until it regenerates , Klein, let it go." Dynamm said to him as his guildmate eyed the Titan nervously. Klein nodded, but a feminine scream drew his attention behind him. He gasped at the horrifying situation that was unfolding behind them.

Kirito stood, his two swords out in front of him, in between the two other abnormal Titans. And in each Titan's hand was one of the girls whom Kirito had been standing with. The Titan on his right dangled by her feet a struggling Asuna, whilst the Titan on his left gripped Lisbeth around her waist. Kirito had an incredibly pained look on his face, and Klein could instantly see why. No matter what he or anyone else did, only Kirito could get to only one of them in time to try and cut them free. Whoever he chose, the other was going to be eaten, end of story.

The girls knew that, too, and what made it worse was that they all knew who Kirito was going to pick. Not meeting anyone's gaze, the Black Swordsman charged at the Titan to his right, while on his left Lisbeth screamed his name. With a single crosscut Kirito freed Asuna from the Titan's grasp, but already the other Titan was too far away, and beggining to lower the pink-haired blacksmith into it's mouth. All they could do was stare in horror. _We evacuated this Floor, _thought Klein_, but at a price like this, is there a point to anything?! What will we do when there's no other Floor to fall back to? _

Despite it's futility, Kirito and Asuna charged at the other Titan, shouting her name. She gave them a stoic look from practically within the Titan's jaws. Lisbeth was trying her best not to break down in her last moments. Klein felt a shiver run up and down his spine. Then another. And another. _That's not a shiver. That's..._Klein gasped as he recognized the tingling sensation that occurred All of a sudden, Kirito, Asuna, Klein, Lisbeth, and everyone else started glowing, and a familiar shrill whine of sound filled their ears. "What the-!?" Klein exclaimed as the light and sound enveloped him.

When Klein could see and hear again, he blinked as he felt a massive case of déjà vu. The place was familiar. Far too familiar. In fact, except for the number and equipment of the players present, it was practically identical to the day two years ago where all 9, 787 living players had been mass-teleported here on the day of Sword Art Online's official launch only to be informed that the game they were playing had now become both their home and a struggle of life or death for freedom. Klein looked around, only affirming the fact in his mind that, yes, the setting was identical: The main square of the Town of Begginings on the 1st Floor, with the sky covered in the red Warning hexagons of the SAO system.

Suddenly, he heard Asuna cry out from amongst the crowd, the brown-haired KOB commander charging right past him. Right at a certain girl curled up on the ground, shuddering in terror. _Lisbeth? _Klein thought in surprise as he recognized the blacksmith. _She's alive!?_ He breathed a sigh of relief. Lisbeth initially tried to resist the comfort of the other girl, but her strength was gone and she allowed Asuna to wrap her in her arms. "You're alive. You're alive. We're safe." Asuna said.

Kirito ran up to them, but Klein put his hand out in front of his friend. "We all understand the choice you had to make there, but that doesn't change the fact that you need to stay out of this right now." Kirito opened his mouth as if to protest, but then closed it and nodded glumly.

"So what do you think he means by this, dragging us back here?" Kirito asked Klein.

"Who?"

"Kayaba. You see it too, don't you? It's exactly like it was two years ago. Except...less of us." Kirito got a wistful look and stared off into space is if reliving painful memories when he said the last part.

Klein nodded. As he looked around, he only then truly realized just how much the numbers of the living had decreased. They had lost 4,000 people before the Titans, though half of that had been in the chaos of the first month, and the casualty rate had dropped sharply after that. But, then, in one week, over 800 players had been devoured. _There's practically only half of us left_, Klein realized. _Of all the faces I saw that first day in SAO, how many of them have died?_ Klein looked up at the sky, silently cursing Kayaba and his twisted perversion of a world intended for fun.

As if in response to his cursing, however, the giant GM avatar that Kayaba had appeared to them as last time showed up, dominating the Floor 1 skyline. However, the hooded figure that had addressed them last time skipped the previous dramatic blood-from-the-sky entrance and instead merely flashed into existence. "Welcome back, players." It said in the same haunting monotone voice as before, raising it's fleshless arms as if in greeting. "Though there are not as many of you as there were two years ago, I must congratulate those of you who have made it this far. For those of you who may not remember the opening tutorial, I am Kayaba Akihiko, the creator, and until last week, ruler of this world."

Author's Notes: I hope you enjoyed the chapter! Do not fear, Armin and the rest of the Attack on Titan crew will return to the story next chapter! Please continue with the numerous reviews you guys have been giving me, positive or negative I love feedback! And now to address two related issues:

1) I only received two votes on my poll as to how you guys would like me to respond to reviews, so I will leave it open until the next chapter of Attack on Aimcrad is open in the hope of getting more responses.

2) While I will continue to write as much as I can for Attack on Aincrad, there will be a bit of a lull as I am starting 2 new Sword Art Online fanfictions the first chapters of which I hope to have up in at most 2 weeks from now. The first, Ties of Black and Blood, explores what might have happened had Kirito chosen to remain with Klein, rather than take off for the next town at the beggining of the death game. It is being cowritten by myself and RL friend BandOfTheHawk. The second, Dance of the Floating Castle, explores what might have happened to Leafa, Kirito, and Asuna if, during the time that both games were running, the ALO and SAO servers were merged.

I hope you enjoyed the latest chapter of Attack on Aincrad, and are looking forward to my upcoming new stories as much as I am! Please leave me a review or send me a PM, and follow my mostly anime blog on Tumblr (Spartaku 17)!


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